Scot Men Take Second, Women Third at Annual Home Invite

Brendan Callahan finished second at the Wooster Invitational, just 17 seconds behind the leader.

The College of Wooster cross country teams used the home course to their advantage on Saturday (Sept. 27), both finishing in the top-three at the Wooster Invitational. The men's squad came in second, only behind Div. II Ashland University (19), with a score of 57 points, while the women raced their way to a third-place finish of 87 points, behind team champion Denison University (25) and Ashland (39).

Top individual honors went to Ashland's Nate Iler, who won the men's 8K in 26:55, and Elaine Binkley of Denison, who took the women's 5K race with a time of 19:31.

For the Scots, the men were led by senior team captain Brendan Callahan. He was just 17 seconds behind Iler, as his time of 27:12 was good to place second overall in the field of 87. A strong performance from sophomore teammate Charlie Van Gombos brought up the rest of the squad. Van Gombos' mark of 27:50 put him in eighth, while close behind was classmate Taylor Delhagen in 11th (28:07).

Rounding out Wooster's scorers were junior Matthew Linman and senior Patrick Wynne, with the duo placing 17th (28:37) and 25th overall (29:06), respectively.

In the women's event, which featured 105 individual competitors, freshman Katie Wieferich paced the Scots. At her first regulation home meet, she finished up in fourth-place at 19:55, while seniors Colleen Call and Karina Colbenson brought up the remainder of the team by finishing closely together at 19th (21:00) and 21st (21:02), respectively.

Additional scorers for Wooster were junior Lindsey Dieringer, who lapped the hilly course in 21:25 for 27th-place, and junior Erin Jacob, a newcomer to the cross county team, who finished 29th overall (21:33).

The Scots will be off from competition for the second time in three weeks, and can next be seen in action at the All-Ohio Championships on Oct. 10, in Delaware, Ohio.