Lake Superior State's Cross Country team competed for the third time this season, racing at the Lucian Rosa Invitational in Kenosha, WI on Saturday. Both teams posted solid mid-table finishes, as the Lakers Men's Cross Country team took eighth place and the Women took 12th place.

Second-year Men's runner Birk Seagren led the way for Lake State, placing 30th and posting a time of 27:43.2. He posted the team's best time for the first time this season, on a day that featured difficult conditions.

"It was definitely a step up for us in terms of competition," stated Laker Head Coach Matt Stith. "It was a step up in difficulty of the course that we ran and unfortunately it turned out to be a difficulty of the weather, but it was a good day top to bottom for our men in terms of competitiveness."

Stith praised Seagren and Gavin Guggemos for their work at the meet. While the pair didn't post their best times, they worked through difficult conditions that few runners would have called ideal. "On the men's side, I definitely want to salute Birk Seagren and Gavin Guggemos who were our first two finishers," said Stith. "They ran very brave and really challenged themselves, very proud of their efforts." Third-year runner Guggemos was the second Laker to finish, with a time of 28:09.1. 

For the women's team, second-year Lilly Binger and third-year Izzy Yeoman finished back-to-back for the second consecutive meet in the 6K run. Binger logged a time of 24:18.5 and Yeoman finished at 24:26.1 for LSSU.

"In the women's event, we saw some really strong pack running in the early part of the race," said Stith. "Lilly led us with a very strong through the middle part of the race in particular, along with Izzy who was right there with her."

The Lakers narrowly took 12th over Concordia-St. Paul. Lake State ran seven, though only the top five score in cross country scoring formats. Even though the sixth and seventh runners don't directly score points for their teams, they do ruin point totals for anybody finishing top five on their own teams later in the race. LSSU runners Sarah McDaniel finished 161st and Michaela Kurth took 177th, pushing Concordia's fourth place runner to 184th and fifth place finisher down to 191st. The points proved critical to the Lakers leaping over Concordia for 12th in the meet, with just two points separating the teams. The points were critical considering Concordia's top finisher came in sixth for the race. Stith pointed to McDaniel and Kurth as the critical runners in securing the result.

"Because they ran hard all the way through the course – when you're the sixth or seventh runner and you're not directly part of the team score, sometimes the temptation a tough day did is to ease off a little bit," said the Lakers Head Coach. "Neither of them did and because they didn't, and because of how cross country scoring works, those two finished hard and finished ahead scoring runners from Concordia. By doing so, they ended up getting us a team win over Concordia that we would not have gotten otherwise. Literally every member of the team contributed directly to us having success as a team today. That makes you proud as a coach."

The Lucian Rosa Invitational marks a key moment in the Lakers schedule. Their next event is the Warrior Classic in Willow Metropark, MI, hosted in two weeks by Wayne State. Shortly afterward, the Lakers head to the GLIAC Championships, set for November 6th. Stith said that he feels confident with where his teams are at in their preparation for the big meets at season's end.

"I feel like our training is very much on track," added Stith. "We have a very clear ambition to be really set up to do well at GLIAC's and at Regionals. We are doing the things we need to be doing at this point in the season, very excited about the potential this team has."

Follow the team all season long on the new Lake Superior State Lakers app, now available on the App Store and Google Play.