Women's Results | Men's Results

SIOUX FALLS, S.D.—South Dakota women's cross country placed five runners in the top-10 to capture an Augustana Twilight title with 23 points on Friday evening at Yankton Trail Park. The Coyote men finished third in the university division with 78 points.
 
Following South Dakota in the women's university standings were Kansas State in second with 42 points, Nebraska in third with 65 points and Summit foe Omaha in fourth with 105. South Dakota successfully defended its 2014 Augustana Twilight title. Nebraska captured the men's title with 17 points and Kansas State took second with 48.
 
"It's pretty exciting," said USD head cross country coach Dan Fitzsimmons. "We weren't sure what to expect coming here. Practices have been going well, but it's tough until you see it come to fruition in a competition. We still have a few things to work on, like closing up our time gap. The exciting part for us is that when you look at the top-five finishers today, there were several women up there who have not been in our top five. We feel we are a pretty deep team, but it's now a matter of when we get to stiffer competition if we can keep that pack."
 
Sophomore Megan Billington and junior Erin Wetzstein led the Coyotes with second- and third-place finishes in the university division. The duo were third and fourth overall. Billington crossed the mat in 16 minutes, 43.48 seconds, and Wetzstein followed shortly after in 16:45.28. Wetzstein dropped more than one minute off her time from two years ago.
 
Coyote alumna Amber Eichkorn holds the three-mile course record in 15:48.11.
 
Freshman Kianna Stewart took fourth place, clocking 16:52.12 for her first collegiate race. Sophomore Lindsay Joyce finished sixth in 16:55.94. Sophomore Madeline Huglen anchored the Coyotes in eighth place with a 17:05.15 clocking.
 
Rounding out the Coyotes' lead pack were junior Bailey Oettel in 12th, senior Jessica Feldman in 14th, sophomore Bethany Kozak in 16th and freshman Julia Noah in 19th. South Dakota averaged 16:52.40 for the three-mile course among its top seven athletes, eight seconds faster than runner-up Kansas State.
 
"Pierce Libbey went down early in the race and that hurt us on the men's side," Fitzsimmons said. "He has been running as our number one since we started fall camp. But he got up and finished in our top seven. Eldon stepped up for us and had a good race, Brice and Mach ran well, and Hunter Paulsen had probably his best race yet as a Coyote. There were definitely a lot of positive things about tonight, but with a lot of room for improvement."
 
The Coyote men were led by sophomore Eldon Warner in 11th place with a 19:35.18 clocking. Junior Brice Cowman finished 16th in 19:48.95 and senior Mach Dojiok was 20th in 20:01.11.
 
Sophomores Jacob Simmons and Hunter Paulsen rounded out the Coyote scorers in 22nd and 23rd, respectively. The duo crossed the line a second apart in 20:21.18 and 20:22.21.
 
The Coyote harriers resume action at Nebraska's Woody Greeno Invitational on Sept. 17.