WARRENVILLE, IL – Millikin cross country competed at the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin championship on Saturday at St. James Farm in Warrenville, Illinois. The men raced to their first top-three finish since 2022, while the women finished in seventh.
Junior Reece Peters paced the Big Blue men with an 11th-place finish in 25:41.4. Senior Josh LaChance followed five spots behind Peters, finishing 16th in 26:03.5. Both runners earned Second-Team All-CCIW by finishing in the top 20.
Senior Aiden Pacunas (23rd/26:26.6) and junior Joey McGinn (25th/26:41.0) finished in the top 25, while sophomore Talan Thrasher crossed the finish line in 26th at 26:41.5. Senior Will Turvey (32nd/26:52.2) and junior captain Aaron Mohr (34th/26:58.9) rounded out the top seven.
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Sophomore Lindsey Klaus led the way for the second time this season, finishing just outside the top 20 in 22nd with a time of 22:57.4. She now sits 20th all time in 6K times following today's performance.
Fellow sophomores Jillian Conlon (31st/23:22.4), Emma Mathews (33rd/23:26.9) and Kiley Coker (36th/23:30.9), along with junior captain Teyla Wendt (41st/23:33.6), all placed in the top 50. Sophomore Brynn Behrmann (51st/24:02.7) and freshman Alaina Karker (65th/24:59.7) completed the top seven for the Big Blue.
Quoting Director of Cross Country and Track & Field Andrew Craycraft
On the men's team performance
"We're super proud of this team. Though we didn't have the race that we were capable of the front half of our scoring five did a great job of keeping us in range."
"I'm proud of the team race that we ran. It reflected who these guys have committed to be to each other. We had seven guys in front of the runner-up team's fifth. That kind of depth doesn't happen without these guys caring deeply for each other and the work that we do together."
On the women's team performance
"I thought we started out really well... St. James can be a tough course because of the bottleneck a few hundred meters off the start line, so you need to position yourself early. The women did a great job of that but settled back further than we would've wanted. With that, this group is incredibly resilient, and we are extremely proud of how they collected themselves and pushed themselves till the end."
"They are such a cohesive group and have done so many things right this year. We lost our number one runner for the last two years in Brooklyn Sweikar, and there's just no way to soften the impact of that. But the way that we persevered and the way they carried themselves despite that was something to be proud of."
Millikin cross country now sets their sights on the NCAA Midwest Regional on Saturday, Nov. 14 in Rock Island, Illinois.
