Oct. 4, 2003
CENTREVILLE, VA ... The George Mason women finished third and the Patriot men were sixth Saturday in the annual Mason Invitational cross country meet at Bull Run Regional Park.
Hofstra had the top three finishers in the women's 5,000-meter race and edged Howard, 33-39, in claiming the team title. Host George Mason was third with 82 points, Radford was fourth with 106, and Delaware and Mount St. Mary's tied for fifth with 119 points each.
Delaware saw its top five finishers place among the top nine runners in the men's 8,000-meter race to easily outdistance second-place Hofstra, 26-70. Radford was third with 74 points, Howard was fourth with 102, Mount St. Mary's fifth with 126 and George Mason sixth with 128. In addition, Howard defeated George Mason in a dual meet, 23-35.
Hofstra's Jen Campbell won the women's race with a time of 19 minutes, 26.46 seconds and she was followed by teammates Danielle Buonpane (19:50.20) and Lisa Melchione (19:50.71). Delaware's Patrick Riley won the men's event with a time of 25 minutes, 30.38 seconds.
Junior Sara Hines led the George Mason women by placing eighth in 20:18.38. Hines was followed to the finish line by teammates junior Nicole Holifield, who was 15th in 20:46.00; senior Dana Early, 17th in 20:53.15; junior Ryann Holmes, 22nd in 21:08.52; and sophomore Jessica Young, 28th in 21:31.10. For scoring purposes (the top seven finishers for each team score points, but the top five determine the team score), Hines was seventh, Holifield was 14th, Early 16th, Holmes 20th and Young 25th.
For the Patriot men, sophomore Andy Tramel led the way as he placed 19th with a time of 27:57.38. Following Tramel for Mason were sophomore Dennis Moriarty, who was 22nd in 28:05.20; senior Ricardo Cunningham, 32nd in 28:38.71; senior Ben Sommers, 39th in 29:00.79; and junior Mike Akindele, 45th in 30:14.89. For scoring purposes, Tramel was 17th, Moriarty was 18th, Cunningham 25th, Sommers 31st and Akindele 37th.
The George Mason men and women return to action in two weeks as they compete at the Maryland Invitational on Saturday, Oct. 18.
