Women's cross country earns third place finish at 2016 Liberty League Championship

By: Joe Venniro - Executive Director of Sports Information

Riley Joslin

Women's Cross Country | 10/29/2016 2:12:00 PM

GENEVA, NY – Senior Emma Jones (Rochester, NY/Rush-Henrietta) became the first Tiger runner to earn four consecutive all-league honors, helping lead the RIT women's cross country team to a third place finish at the 2016 Liberty League Championship, held at Seneca Lake Park and hosted by Hobart and William Smith Colleges on Saturday. RIT finished with a team score of 71 points.

Jones recorded her best showing at the league championship, finishing third overall out of 121 runners in a time of 23:02.3. Jones was sixth in the Liberty League Championship as a freshman in 2013 and recorded back-to-back fifth place finishes in 2014 and 2015.

Rensselaer won the team title for the second straight season with 30 points, just ahead of St. Lawrence, who finished with 46 points. The Engineers had four of the top seven finishers, while St. Lawrence had three of the top eight.

Megan Kellogg of St. Lawrence was the individual winner, completing the 6,000-meter course in a time of 22:06.9, 21 seconds in front of Rensselaer's Jamie Lord.

Individual finishers in spots one through seven earned All-Liberty League first-team honors while finishers in places eight through 14 were recognized as All-Liberty League second-team honorees.

Sophomore Becca Schwan (LeRoy, NY/LeRoy) was RIT's second best finisher, placing 13th overall in a time of 23:56.0 to earn All-Liberty League second team honors. It was her first all-league accolade for cross country.

Junior Keira Higgins (Schenevus, NY/Milford), an All-Liberty second team finisher in 2015, just missed duplicating that honor this year, placing 16th overall in a time of 24:06.7. Jennifer Crossen (Bason, NY/Oakfield-Alabama) placed 20th in 24:16.7, while sophomore Nicole Mackey (South New Berlin, NY/Unadilla Valley) and junior Martine Bosch (Endwell, NY/Maine-Endwell) were 22nd and 23rd respectively, four seconds apart.

Jeriann Beiter (Lima, NY/Honeoye Falls-Lima) (29th – 24:34), Hannah Weppner (East Aurora, NY/East Aurora) (40th - 24:54.4), Faith Gruver (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena) (43rd - 24:59.4), and Alex Carpenter (Webster, NY/Webster Thomas) (49th – 25:11) rounded out top-50 finishes for the Tigers.

The Tigers are back in action on Saturday, Nov. 12 at the NCAA Atlantic Region Championship hosted by Rowan University in Sewell, N.J. The meet begins at 12 p.m.