Lute Women Struggle at West Region Championships

Meet Results

Corinne Gogert - top PLU finisher

ESTACADA, Ore. - Two weeks ago, the Pacific Lutheran women's cross country team finished in a fifth-place tie at the Northwest Conference Championships. So entering the NCAA Division III West Region Cross Country Championships held Saturday morning at McIver Park, the Lutes had as their goal to improve on that finish against conference teams running at the regional meet.

Instead of moving up and into the top four conference finishers, however, the Lutes had a tough day and dropped a couple of spots to seventh among their NWC compatriots. When it was all said and done, the Lutes finished 12th in the 16-team regional championship meet. Willamette successfully defended its title behind defending national champion Sarah Zerzan, who won the individual championship by nearly 50 seconds. Zerzan clocked 20:51.65, well ahead of teammate Maddie Coffman and her time of 21:40.85.

Willamette won the meet with 43 points followed by Puget Sound with 86. Colorado College was third with 121, followed by Whitman with 133. Besides Willamette, UPS and Whitman, other conference schools finishing ahead of PLU were Lewis & Clark in fifth, Whitworth in eighth, George Fox in 11th. PLU had tied Whitworth for fifth place at the conference meet.

As she has through most of the season, freshman Corinne Gogert paced the Lutes, finishing 32nd overall in a time of 23:27.15. Rounding out the top five for PLU were Lexie Miller, 47th in a time of 23:52.90, Mary Wuest, 51st in a time of 23:56.15, Katie Choate, 71st in a time of 24:25.80, and Lauren McDonald, 72nd in a time of 24:29.10.