Players Mentioned
Pirates Head to Delaware for Second Meet of 2015
9/11/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Cross Country
SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. - The Seton Hall cross country program is back in action this weekend as both Pirate squads are headed to the Delaware Invitational for the second installment of the 2015 season.
Both the men's and women's squads are looking to build off third-place efforts at last week's season-opening Monmouth XC Kick-Off and replicate the form that saw each team earn a top-three finish during a trip to Delaware last fall as well.
On the men's side, the Pirates saw four underclassmen score in the first meet of the season as Bryant Cordova (Elizabeth, N.J.) paced a group of seven Hall runners in the top-20 overall with an 11th-place effort in the 6K event.
Classmate Louis Bustamante (Hamburg, N.J.) was right on Cordova's heels with a third-place finish while another sophomore in Jeff Larson (Yucca Valley, Calif.) claimed 14th with a time of 19:47.82. Junior Sean Kip (Union, N.J.) and sophomore Jake Simon (Freehold, N.J.) rounded out a scoring group that reflected the progress the program has made as a whole.
With Kip and Simon edging out Victor Ricci (Narragansett, R.I.) and Alex Mallue (Canton, Ohio) for the final two spots in the team's top-five, the results marked the first time since a trip to the Delaware Invitational last September that neither Ricci, Ryan Flannery (Forked River, N.J.) or Cameron Quisenberry (Owensboro, Ky.) has contributed to the team score.
Simon delivered 8K mark of 27:16.18 that was third-fastest among 108 male collegiate competitors at the same meet a year ago, recording his first team-leading time in the process. Larson and Kip also cracked the scoring group to help The Hall claim a team title but two spots in the team rankings will be up for grabs following the departures of John and Kevin Walsh '15.
In women's competition, senior stalwart Amanda Quaglia (Reading, Pa.) topped the team sheet a week ago at Monmouth, placing less than two seconds outside the top-10 overall. In the absence of Christiana Rutkowski (Middletown, N.J.) who led the Pirates in all nine meets during 2014, Quaglia set the pace for a Seton Hall top-five that also included a top-20 overall showing in what was the collegiate debut for newcomer Kiley Britten (Crystal Lake, Ill.).
Quaglia and Britten were joined by Desyre Blackburn (Aloha, Ore.), Bailey Seach (Winston Salem, N.C.) and Emily Johnson (Wildwood, Crest, N.J.) in opening their season in scoring fashion and based on last year's results, a repeat performance may be in store on Saturday.
The Seton Hall women ran to a third-place finish last fall at Delaware thanks in large part to a breakout performance from Johnson who recorded a personal-best second-place finish among the team. Quaglia ranked third on the squad, ahead of Blackburn and Seach on a day in which all five Seton Hall scorers clocked in among the top-25 competitors overall.
Senior Bri Miller (Bayonne, N.J.) narrowly missed out on adding a sixth top-25 effort, coming in with a 6K time of 26:38.15 at Delaware last season and is part of a trio that includes Holli Rolle (Nassau, Bahamas) and Olivia Gregorio (Kingston, Pa.) that will be looking to push the pace and enter the team's top-five after finishing within 17 seconds of each other a week ago.
Tomorrow's slate will call for an 8K run on the men's side and 6K competition for the women. Start-time is slated for 10:00 a.m. from White Clay Creek State Park in Newark, Del.
