Jags cross country enters SWAC play

On Saturday September 29, the Southern University Cross-Country Team met Alcorn State in their first Southwestern Athletic Conference match-up. Two days later Monday, October 1 they competed against Northwestern State in Natchitoches, LA.
Southern first encounter with Alcorn came during their first meet, held in Baton Rouge, Louisiana at Highland Road Park one of the harder sites to run. SU placed second and Alcorn State third in a meet against two other schools.
“Saturday was not a good meet at Alcorn,” said Coach Johnny Thomas. “We were expecting to run a 3.2 mile course and a five mile course. Instead, we ran two miles woman and three miles men. The team was not able to get into the meet.” SU and Alcorn were the only schools competing in this meet. Southern was expecting to use this meet to get the feel of what course they will be running at Conference meet. The team was not able to get the feel of the meet at all, due to fact, that this was the shortest distance they ran all season.
“It was the team’s second time meeting with some of these school and this time around our team scores were better,” said Coach Thomas.
Monday, at Northwestern State Invitational meet SU Cross Country team performed well. Both men and women ran short of one runner, due to the fact, that they had very important classes to attend. The men had a new comer Kory Cruwpe who ran his first five-mile run ever.
“We have a 6th man now on team and his performance was exceptional for his first time running,” said Coach Thomas.
This was another big meet for SU with eight other schools running in the meet.
“The team is building themselves up to the top,” said Coach Thomas. “They want to continue improving and building up until SWAC Championships.”
The SU Cross Country will be in action again October 13, in Hammond, La at the Southeastern State Invitational.