Aggie women second in Wisconsin B race, Karis Jochen runner-up

Friday, October 14

Madison, Wis.

11:00 AM

Texas A&M

Wisconsin Nuttycombe Invitational

Oct 14, 2016 | Cross Country

Wisconsin men's results Wisconsin women's results Wisconsin men's B results Wisconsin women's B results

MADISON, Wisc. – Texas A&M women placed second in the women's B race on Friday at the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational and was led by individual runner-up Karis Jochen. The Aggie men finished 29^th among the elite field in the championship division with 641 points and were led by Elliott Farris, who placed 70^th overall.

"It was a positive step for the women," said Texas A&M assistant coach Wendel McRaven. "You want to put yourself in position to be successful. The reason we ran in the B race was I thought it would give us an opportunity to be successful, because of where we're at as a team right now. They took a positive step and competed better.

"The men's race was disappointing. They're disappointed in themselves and we're better than that performance. That's the chance you take coming to meet like this. We knew that coming in."

Jochen led the women's B field of 118 runners over the latter half of the 6,000-meter race, crossing 2k and 4k splits in 7:12 and 14:17, as she built a six-second advantage. On the uphill portion of the finish Washington's Isobel Batt-Doyle claimed the lead and won the race in 21:05.0. Jochen ran 21:11.8 as the runner-up with Michigan State's Karrigan Smith in third at 21:14.0.

"It was a good training effort," stated Jochen. "We didn't back down at all for this race in terms of intensity or volume. So I felt lucky in the fact that I was able to get a good race and hard effort in without having to compensate my training because nationals are still five weeks away."

McRaven noted: "I was pleased with Karis, she used this race as a stepping stone for the postseason."

Michigan State claimed the team title in the B race with 45 points as the Aggies were second with 108 points. Rounding out the top five teams were North Carolina State (113), Washington State (137) and San Francisco (147).

Devin Norton ran 22:06.6 as the second Texas A&M finisher, placing 27^th, while freshman Ashley Driscoll clocked a time of 22:11.2 to place 32^nd. Rounding out the Aggie team score were Arin Rice, who posted a 22:16.2 to finish 36^th, and Katie Watson, who ran 22:21.8 in 41^st.

The rest of the women's team included Haley Deakins (51^st – 22:25.8), Kelsey Persyn (75^th – 22:42.4), Laura Craig (79^th – 22:46.2), and Lauryn Barrientos (81^st – 22:48.0).

No 1 ranked Northern Arizona totaled 78 points to capture the team title in the men's championship race as No. 11 Stanford (118) and No. 3 BYU (144) placed second and third. No. 2 Syracuse (167), the defending champion, finished fourth with No. 8 Iona (240) in fifth. Justyn Knight of Syracuse won the men's individual title in 23:53.1.

No. 3 Washington won the women's championship team title with 124 points over No. 2 North Carolina State (166) and No. 1 Providence (170). Rounding out the top five were No. 11 New Mexico (207) and No. 21 Baylor (228). Boise State's Brenna Peloquin was the women's individual winner in 20:00.8.

Farris ran among the lead pack of runners early on in the race and was the top Aggie throughout, running 24:49.3 on the 8,000m course. His splits through each 2k were 6:06, 12:20 (4k) and 18:48 (6k).

"It was a different type of race than we have been running," said Farris. "It was very competitive and they went out real hard. The conditions were a little bit tough today, and we had an off day as a team. We're not going to let that define us, though. We just have to move forward to the next step."

Behind the leading effort of Farris for the Aggies, the second finisher for Texas A&M was Cameron Villarreal in 105^th as he ran 25:04.3. Austin Wells clocked 25:24.7 to place 143^rd and Christian Farris ran 25:30.9 to finish 152^nd.

Rounding out the Aggie team score as the fifth runner was freshman Jon Bishop, placing 171^st in 25:58.5. The sixth and seventh runners for Texas A&M were Colin Stoeber (192^nd – 26:53.7) and Jacob Perry (193^rd – 27:07.4).

"Elliott did a solid job and Bishop, our freshman, did a respectable job as our fifth runner today," said McRaven. "However, we were too strung out and we can't do that. Because of that we got thumped. You don't like getting thumped, but we have time to regroup for the championship portion of the season.

"We have to rely on our depth and have our first through fifth, or even sixth and seventh, runners finish in a tight spread. They kind of got a little lost out there today."

A trio of Aggies ran in the men's B race with Ryan Teel leading the crew in 59^th (26:34.4) as Juan Uribe finished 60^th (26:36.2). Taylor Clayton placed 80^th (27:30.5).