Statesmen Run in Grinnell Les Duke Invite

Grinnell--A short-handed William Penn women's cross country team made a quick trip north Saturday as it competed in the Grinnell Les Duke Invitational.

WPU was sixth out of six teams with 173 points, while Central topped the standings with 22 points.

Central swept the top honors with Maddy Stevens winning the 6K competition in 23:23.1.  A total of 89 runners were in the field Saturday.

Emmalee Wells-Stout (Fr., Oskaloosa, Iowa, Business Management) was the first Statesmen harrier to cross the line, doing so in 56th place with a time of 27:57.5.

Audrey Etter (Fr., Remsen, Iowa, Entrepreneurship and Small Business Management) claimed runner-up honors for the navy and gold in 72nd (29:52.9).

The trio of Mallory Ostroski (Fr., Le Grand, Iowa, Kinesiology) (85th, 32:44.5), Morgan Taylor (Sr., Galesburg, Ill., Nursing) (86th, 33:02.0), and Nathaly Peralta (Fr., Dallas, Texas, New Media) (87th, 35:21.6) then completed William Penn's scoring.

"We were without a couple of our teammates today, so we did not finish where we might have otherwise," Head Coach Caleb Drake said.  "The hills, the heat, and the difficult course made for a challenging day.  It is hard, however, to really feel any certain way when not having our full team out there, but those who competed today each ran their own race with toughness.  We will get back to work as a full squad and be ready to roll in a couple weeks."

Next Up: William Penn takes a week off before returning to action on Friday, September 26 as it travels to Pella to compete in the Central Dutch Open at 5 p.m.