Women's Results | Men's Results

IOWA CITY, Iowa—The South Dakota men's and women's teams posted runner-up finishes in the NCAA Regional Preview at the Ashton Cross Country Course on Saturday morning.
 
The women's field featured several ranked teams from the NCAA Midwest Region. No. 12 Illinois captured the title with 50 points, while 10th-ranked South Dakota tallied 58 points to finish runner-up. No. 13 Iowa placed third with 66 points and No. 7 Northern Illinois came in fourth with 70 points. Northwestern and Omaha rounded out the six-team field.
 
"We were a little conservative from the gun on the women's side," USD head coach Dan Fitzsimmons said. "After the first third of the race, we were clear back in fifth as a team. We ran the final 2,000 meters incredibly well, but wound up just short of Illinois. If the race had been just a little longer, I think we would have run them down. We had some new faces in our top five, which is a nice showing of our team's depth.
 
"Both our men and women posted a lot of personal bests today. The course is not flat by any means with a lot of rolling hills. The grass was thick and clumpy from the rain, but we managed to still run fast times."
 
Junior Erin Wetzstein and sophomore Megan Billington posted personal bests and finished sixth and seventh, respectively, to lead the Coyotes. Wetzstein crossed the line in 21 minutes, 47 seconds, with Billington crossing a second later. The duo improved their 6,000-meter bests from last year's Bradley Classic. Wetzstein had a 25 second personal best and Billington improved her time by 16 seconds.
 
While they each averaged 5:50 splits per mile, Wetzstein and Billington had unique races. Billington was in the lead group from the start of the race, while Wetzstein was at the front of the chase pack. Wetzstein made a push to catch the leaders on her own, meeting up with Billington in the middle. The pair caught several places in the final third of the race.
 
Freshman Julia Noah was the third Coyote across the line in 12th place. Noah clocked 21:58.5, a minute faster than her first collegiate 6,000 meters at Nebraska two weeks ago. Noah jumped 20 places in the middle third of the race.
 
Redshirt-sophomore Bethany Kozak and sophomore Madeline Huglen took 16th and 17th, respectively. Kozak finished in 22:13.9 while Huglen clocked a 43 second personal best with a time of 22:17.2. The women featured an impressive 30 second spread between scorers.
 
The Coyotes were rounded out by freshman Kianna Stewart in 20th and sophomore Lindsay Joyce in 35th.
 
On the men's side, No. 12 Iowa swept the first seven spots in the field with a perfect score of 15. South Dakota finished runner-up with 49 points and Western Illinois took third with 80 points.
 
"We have been aiming to have five men run under 26:40 this season," Fitzsimmons said. "We took a huge step forward today with two runners under 26 minutes and four under that mark. Eldon and Brice looked tremendous today and followed our race plan exactly. Brice still looked like he had a lot in the tank after the finish."
 
Sophomore Eldon Warner continued as the Coyotes' frontrunner in eighth place with his first 8,000-meter race under 26 minutes after crossing in 25:51.0. Junior Brice Cowman was close behind in 25:52.1 for ninth.
 
Senior Mach Dojiok clocked 26:12.2 for 12th place. Sophomore Pierce Libbey improved his personal best by 26 seconds by finishing in 14th place in 26:22.6. Sophomore Jacob Simmons was the fifth Coyote across the line in 17th place with a personal best 26:55.1. The men posted a 1:04.1 spread between scorers.
 
Sophomores Hunter Paulsen and Nate Wendt took 18th and 23rd, respectively, to round out the top seven Coyotes.