Monday, September 27, 2010

Gophers Happy with Griak Performances

The University of Minnesota men's and women's cross country teams were pleased with their performances at Saturday's Roy Griak Invitational.

The #27-ranked Gopher men placed 5th in the Men's Gold race with 136 points. #19-ranked Duke won with 83 points, followed by co-#11-ranked North Carolina State and New Mexico, and #16 BYU.

Ben Blankenship led the squad with a 10th-place finish, followed closely by teammates Pieter Gagnon, 14th, and Mike Tochia, 15th. (The trio is pictured above in their finish order.)

“I think our top three guys ran well,” Gopher head coach Steve Plasencia said. “We also had some of our young guys step up a bit. We still need to find more depth. Overall it was a decent meet for us.”

Find full Men's Gold Division results HERE.

The #28-ranked Gopher women finished 7th in the Women's Gold race with 185 points. #21 Arizona won with 76 points followed by #18 New Mexico, #15 Iowa State, #7 Duke, #14 Providence, and un-ranked Boston College.

The Gopher women, who were led by the runner-up individual finish of Stephanie Price, topped #27 Penn State and national poll vote-getters Arizona State and North Carolina State.

“We ran pretty well,” Gopher head coach Gary Wilson said. “This was an amazingly talented field and I was looking forward to seeing how our young team would respond. They did well overall. Of course we have lots of room for improvement but it’s September. We can learn a lot from today’s race.”

Find full Women's Gold Division results HERE.

Photo by Gene Niemi.

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