Stags Take First at Pomona-Pitzer Invite

CLAREMONT, Calif. – On Saturday morning the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men's cross country team took the top spot in a 12-team field for their third team victory of the season. The Stags finished with 56 team points, six points ahead of second-place Pomona-Pitzer (62 points), to take first place. Both Pomona-Pitzer and Occidental ran their "B" teams in the race, while their "A" teams ran at Pre-Nationals in Elsah, Ill.

Thomas D'Anieri (CMC) was the first to cross the line for the Stags, finishing in fifth place with a time of 25:34.59 on the 8K course. Ahead of D'Anieri were a trio of unattached runners who finished from second to fifth. Julian Sandoval from Whittier won the race with a time of 25:03.12.

Kevin Huang (HMC), Ben Iten (HMC), and Kyle Suver (CMC) also finished in the top-20, placing eighth, 11th, and 20th respectively. Huang finished with a time of 25:55.07 to place eighth in the 137-runner field. Iten was just over five seconds behind Huang with a time of 26:00.85 and Suver crossed in 26:31.99.

Rounding out the top-five for the Stags was freshman Stephen Steinberg (HMC), who finished in a time of 26:41.93 in 27th place.

Just eight seconds later, Brooks MacDonald (HMC) finished in 30th with a time of 26:49.25 to start a stretch of five Stags in the next eight finishers. In addition to MacDonald, the Stags claimed the 33rd, 34th, 35th and 37th spots by Gage Hornung (CMC), Charlie Harris (CMC), Adam Schulze (CMC), and Wilson Ives respectively.

The Stags will now take off a week before running in the SCIAC Championships in two weeks on Oct. 28th in Chino, Calif.