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TERRE HAUTE, Ind. – The Nebraska cross country team competed in the Under Armour Pre-Nationals at the LaVern Gibson Championship Cross Country Course on Saturday. The men's squad took 15th in the 8K "Blue" division with 493 points, while the women's team finished third in the 6K "White" division with 220 points.
George Kusche led the men's team and finished fifth with a personal-best time of 23:31.6. Mark Freyhof and Ryan Martins were the next Huskers to finish and were 92nd (24:46.7) and 99th (24:50.3), respectively. Martins's time was a new PR by 50 seconds. Jordan De Spong was 139th in a time of 25:10.4. Wyatt McGuire competed for the Huskers for the first time this season and was 158th with a time of 25:23.6.
"George (Kusche) is showing he can run with the top guys in the country," Harris said. "He looked in control throughout the race. Our men can run better and this performance set our sights higher in the region. We are going to have to have a much better performance to move up from last year's eighth-place finish at the Big Ten Championships. We benefited as a program coming here. It was good to have Wyatt (McGuire) run, but we will need his improvement back at the elite level."
Erika Freyhof paced the women's squad for the third time this season and placed ninth with a time of 21:15.3. Judi Jones has been one of the first two Huskers to cross the finish line in every meet this season and was 20th in a time of 21:38.2. Elsa Forsberg was also in the top-25 and took 23rd with a time of 21:42.6. Gabrielle Boucher was the fourth Husker to finish and was 57th in a PR time of 22:34.7, beating her previous best by more than 30 seconds. Grace Pagone rounded out the top five for Nebraska and was 111th with a time of 23:20.9.
"Our top three women ran very solid," Coach Harris said. "We need these next two weeks to have some 4-5-6 runners improve. Boucher is running well. We just have to close the time gap between three and four."
The Huskers will return to action on Sunday, Nov. 3 at the Big Ten Championships in Columbus, Ohio. The first race will begin at 10:45 a.m.