Results

HOUSTON -- Houston Baptist University's cross country teams made solid debuts on Saturday morning, each placing fourth at the 33rd annual Rice Invitational. It was the first cross country meet for the Huskies since 1989.
 
Gus Newmeyer placed 20th overall, and freshman Bianca Penalez was 30th Saturday to lead the Houston Baptist University women to its fourth-place team finish.

"Obviously, I am excited to have the team up and running," said head coach Theresa Fuqua. "We set goals for this meet and definitely met them, and I was really pleased with the effort the team showed."

Newmeyer, a transfer from New Mexico Junior College, clocked 14:42.2 over the 3600-meter course, while Penalez crossed the line in 15:08.5. Erica Clark, Sarah Fisher and Sheri Adewale rounded out the scorers for the Huskies, who totaled 121 points to top Prairie View A&M and Texas A&M International. Rice won the team title, and Marissa Daniels took top honors individually for the Owls.

Stanley Kiplimo was 13th individually on the men's side, helping HBU to a fourth place finish as well. A transfer from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Kiplimo clocked 18:34.2 on the 5600-meter course.

Freshman Joshua Pantoja was 18th at 18:59.6 to help HBU score 105 points to top Texas A&M-Kingsville. A&M-Corpus Christi won the team title with 19 points, led by individual champ Shadrack Songok.

"We thought we would be solid in our first meet," said head coach Theresa Fuqua. "Stanley ran a very strong race to lead the team, and our freshmen showed a lot of heart in tough conditions."

Sid Makhunga (28th), Jonathan LeJeune (30th), Spencer McGuffey (33rd) and Sean Jaehne (34th) were the other HBU finishers.

The Huskies will be in action again on Friday, September 28 at the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islander Splash.