MEN'S RESULTS | WOMEN'S RESULTS

FULLERTON, Calif. --- Biola Cross Country season began with a bang on Saturday morning as the Eagles hosted the Biola Invitational at Ted Craig Regional Park for the fourth-straight year. Both teams ran well, with Gabe Plendcio and Ryan Thompson stealing the show at the end of the men's 8k by finishing first and second overall.

The men combined for 53 total points to place second, just behind event-winner CSU San Marcos. The women had a solid start to the season as well, placing fourth in a very tight top of the field, sandwiched between Claremont-Mudd-Scripps and an improved Concordia Irvine side. Mackenna Mason was the top runner for the ladies, finishing as the fifth individual.

The finish to the men's race was the highlight of the day, with Plendcio sitting sixth and Thompson 17th at the last split and then charging hard as the race wore down to take the top two spots in front of a very loud home crowd.

"It felt really great [to be running again]," said Plendcio. "We were eager to get back on the course and get racing again...A regional team beat us today, but we're going to learn from that. We've got lots of things to work on and we'll get even better."

"You guys did a great job executing the way I asked them to," said Head Coach Sean Henning. "We were patient in the beginning and moved up very well throughout the race. Gabe had a great finish. I was proud of how they work together to be great today, and they lost to a very good team in San Marcos."

It was a pack effort for BU out of the gate with all top five runners being within a few strides of one another throughout the first 5k or so. Things spread out a bit, but only so much that the top-5 for BU were within 29 spots of one another. That's not too shabby considering it was an almost 200-person field.

Plendcio's winning time was 25:16.1. After that, the rest of Biola's scorers were Ryan Thompson (2nd - 25:21.5), Brady DeHaven (11th - 25:43.3), Jared Donnel (15th - 25:49.2) and Ryan St. Pierre (29th - 26:11.1).

"The strategy going in was to take it back and stay a little conservative to see how things play out," said Plendcio. "Then the last two loops is when we wanted to really pick it up and catch some guys and put ourselves in spots to win."

Biola's 53 points put it just 11 back from the winning side, CSU San Marcos. The Cougars had finishers in 3rd, 4th, 9th, 10th and 16th to get the win.



The women's race was a bit harder to keep a full group together, but the Eagles always had at least 2-3 ladies near the top, led by Mason and newcomer Grace Catena. Mason's 18:30.1 was good enough for fifth. She was the third PacWest Conference runner to cross the line, following one from Point Loma (second) and another from Hawaii Pacific (fourth). Catena carded a 18:44 flat to finish 16th in her first race for BU.

Clara Haynes, usually in the mix for Biola's top or second finisher sat out this race.

Rounding out the scorer's on the women's side were Kaili Waller (43rd - 19:10.7), Caroline Stetina (65th - 19:39.1) and Mandy Reyes (74th - 19:46.8).

"I think it's only up from here," said Henning. "We have a lot of work to do as a team with running together and being great second half racers. The good thing is we still beat every team in our conference which is always a plus and we did it not at full strength."

"It feels good," said Mason. "It's really nerve-wracking getting back on the starting line, but we were also all really excited. "Our new runners did really well. Grace, our transfer, got second for the team and killed it. All the new freshmen also stepped up for their first college race, so I'm really proud of them."

CSU San Marcos also won the women's 8k team title with four runners finishing in the top-16.

The fields more than tripled in size from last season when Biola finished first and third overall. This time the men took second out of 18 counting teams and the women fourth out of 22 counting teams. All said there were over 400 runners at Craig Regional Park this morning.

Biola takes next week off and then gets right back after it on Sept. 20 with Western Oregon's Sundowner Invitational. That race is run at the same course that hosts the 2019 NCAA Division II West Regional Championships, so it will be great experience for both sides.