Sacred Heart
Stony Brook University Cross Country Invitational
Ferguson Wins as Men's XC Has Strong Showing in Season Opener
9/5/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Cross Country
Sean Ferguson returned to cross country action for the first time since 2013 with a win, and Timothy Loehner and Trevor Guerrera both placed in the top five, as the Sacred Heart men's cross country team opened its season with a third place finish at the stony Brook invitational on Saturday. The Pioneers were just 15 points behind winner Stony Brook with a total of 65 points, while UMass Amherst placed second after accumulating 54 points.
"The men are quite a bit better than last year, and have a chance to be a really good team if we can tighten the time spread between our 1st and 5th runners over the course of the season," said Head Coach Christian Morrison. "It's so nice to have Sean (Ferguson) back running again. He's worked really hard to get to where he is, and he appears poised to have a great season."
Ferguson returned from injury to run the fastest 6k in program history, 18:35.22, en route to his first collegiate cross country victory. The time was also good for both a meet and course record, and improved on his 2013 time by 52 seconds. He took control of the race halfway through, breaking away and never looking back, as he won by a margin of over nine seconds. He was the lone runner to average less than a five-minute mile over the 6k course.
Loehner and Guerrera also broke the old course record of 18:58.71, set by Brendan Copley of Quinnipiac in 2013, while moving into second and third on the school's all-time 6k list. Loehner was narrowly clipped by less than half a second by the second place finisher after crossing in 18:45.32, while Guerrera rounded out the top five in 18:56.35. The two both improved on their times from 2014, as Loehner shaved 1:01 off and Guerrera improved by 40 seconds.
Andrew Handfield was the next Pioneer to cross, as he took 1:22 off his time from a year ago to place 20th with a time of 19:24.75. The Pioneers' final point scorer was freshman Sean Kildare, who ran his first collegiate race in 5:26.4 to finish 45th.
Sacred Heart's next meet will be an important one, as it will give the Pioneers a preview of the 2015 Northeast Conference Championship course. SHU will travel up to Smithfield, R.I. for the Bryant University Cross Country Invitational on Saturday at 10:30 am. The 2015 NEC Championship will be held at the course on Saturday, October 31, as Sacred Heart will look to defend its back-to-back conference titles.
Notes
Bryan Reilly (21:32.12) improved on his time from 2014 17 seconds.
Players Mentioned
