AMES, Iowa – Iowa State true freshmen Marley Crusch and Taylor Peterson finished in fourth and fifth place, respectively, in their first ever collegiate cross country meet. While the true freshmen's scores did not affect the overall team score, the Cyclone women's team still finished first at the Iowa Intercollegiate Meet Saturday on the ISU Cross Country Course. The ISU women finished 19 points ahead of second-place Northern Iowa. Crusch finished with a time of 18 minutes 47 seconds, one second behind the third-place finisher.
“It feels really good,” Crusch said. “We have a really good team out here and it's exciting to come into (a program) that is already set and then have the chance to move forward with it is pretty exciting.”
Crusch is used to running 4,000-meter races in high school, but now at the collegiate level, the extra 1,000-meters was a challenge.
“It's a lot different,” Crusch said. “In high school you can just go out and gun it and go as fast as you want the whole race. It was nice that coach had a plan for us. He had us stick together the first third of the race and then we could spread out. He said not to worry about the beginning of the race and people going out ahead of us.”
With many of Iowa State's top cross country runners not competing at this event, it was an opportune time for the true freshmen to show Ihmels what they could do. Crusch and Peterson competed unattached.
“They are making my weekend hard,” Ihmels said. “I'm going to have to make some decisions over the weekend and early next week on what we're going to do with Marley and Taylor, they did a tremendous job.”
While the average true freshman may run with caution in their first collegiate meet, Crusch and Peterson looked solid.
“They didn't go out scared or apprehensive,” Ihmels said. “They went out and competed really hard, and both did a great job. Now I have to go back and figure out whether or not we're going to redshirt them or not. I told them before the race that they needed to make my job hard this weekend, and they've done that. Now it's in my hands and I have to make a decision. If each year we can have a Marley and a Taylor do this, we're going to continually make progress and that's what is the most exciting part of it.”
The Iowa State men's cross country team finished runner-up to Iowa. Junior Daniel Murray was the first Cyclone across the line for the men's team, finishing eighth overall. Sophomore Charlie Paul finished in 10th place.
Overall, the first Iowa Intercollegiate cross country meet went off without a hitch.
“We had a beautiful day and it was very nice to have as many athletes as we did on the starting line for both races,” Ihmels said. “I think it was well received by the other teams and coaches and hopefully this can become an annual event. Hopefully a year from now we have twice as many teams and just continue on from there.”
The Iowa State cross country team will next travel to Roy Griak Invitational in Minneapolis, Minn., Sept. 26.
Women's Individual Results: 1. Caedryn Schrunk, unattached, 18:06; 4. Marley Crusch, unattached, 18:47; 5. Taylor Peterson, unattached, 18:58; 7. Brittany Rover, IOWA STATE, 19:13; 13; Kellien Oettle, IOWA STATE, 19:44; 14. Ines Fischer, IOWA STATE, 19:44; 17. Erin Penticoff, IOWA STATE, 19:57; 19. Kayla Marsh, IOWA STATE, 20:02.
Women's Team Results: 1. IOWA STATE, 51; 2. Northern Iowa, 70, 3. Morningside, 74; 4. Iowa Central CC, 85; 5. Iowa, 87; 6. Grandview, 168; 7. Iowa Western, 186; 8. Dubuque, 198; 9. NIAC, 219; 10. DMACC, 302.
Men's Individual Results: 1. Jeff Thode, Iowa, 24:50; 8. Daniel Murray, IOWA STATE, 26:22; 10. Charlie Paul, IOWA STATE, 26:30; 12. Alex Whitesell, IOWA STATE, 26:39; 14. Danny Ducharme, unattached, 26:44; 18. Dan Fadgen, IOWA STATE, 27:18; 20. Stephen Saylor, unattached, 27:21; 25. Elphas Sang, IOWA STATE, 27:41; 34. Nick Schulze, unattached, 28:42.
Men's Team Results: 1. Iowa, 17; 2. IOWA STATE, 62; 3. Iowa Central CC, 98; 4. Iowa Western, 109; 5. Morningside, 118; 6. NIAC. 137; 7. Grandview, 215; 8. Buena Vista, 234; Iowa Lakes CC, 279; 10. Dubuque, 285.
Photo Credit Wes Winterink
