Ricks women's team captures its third cross country title
E-mail story
It's easy. Send a link to the story you were just reading to a friend. Just fill out the form on this page and we'll send it along.
Your name and e-mail address are transmitted to the recipient. Otherwise, it is considered private information; see Privacy policy.
The Ricks College Women's cross country team won its third consecutive NJCAA national championship Nov. 15 in winter-like conditions in Levelland, Texas, and Ricks' coach, Doug Stutz, once again was named NJCAA women's cross country Coach of the Year.
The Lady Vikings scored 30 points, one point less than last year's national championship team, and the lowest score yet at the national finals for one of Coach Stutz's teams. In cross country, lowest score wins."Our top five runners finished within 22 seconds of each other. We ran mentally and physically very tough," said the coach.
Alycia Boyer finished fourth and was named first team all-America; Katie Williams finished sixth; Melody Sheppard, seventh; Melanie Clark, eighth, all who were named second team all-America; Natalie Griffeth finished 10th; Tarrah Monson, 22nd; and Melinda Powell, 23rd.
The Ricks College men's team finished sixth in the finals. "The men's teams were much better than I thought," Coach Stutz said. "Overall, our men ran very tough in temperatures below 20 degrees."
Daniel Kemp finished 21st; Dustin Ence was 22nd; Ryan Griffeth, 29th; Jason Brown, 30th; Mike Steele, 34th; Angel Ibarra, 43rd; and Brett Larson, 58th. Host South Plains College won the men's title.
Ricks College, South Plains and Southern Idaho tied for the Best Combined Men's and Women's Teams award.
