September 30, 2002
FLORENCE, S.C. - The remnants of Tropical Storm Isadore couldn't dampen the weekend for the Bluffton College Cross Country team. Encountering delays on the trip down with heavy rain did not slow the Beavers on the course. The men and women took advantage of quick starts to establish their positions in the races and both came up with 3rd place finishes behind strong performances by the Borga siblings.
The men started off the day right with a great team effort on the flat terrain. The highlight of the meet was when the final scores were announced and the beavers had defeated conference rival Defiance convincingly. Bluffton was preceded by Clayton State, S.C. (19) and host Francis Marion University (111). The Beavers were 3rd with 127 points and Defiance was 4th with 146 points.
Senior Steve Borga led the team with a 13th place finish in a personal-best time of 28:48 for the 8,000m course. Close behind was Roy Kaplan finishing in 15th in a 29:03. Rounding out the scoring positions for Bluffton were Andy Schiefer, 26th, 30:05, Josh Tolley, 32nd, 30:49, and Patrick Cooley, 41st, 31:20. Also running for the Beavers were Andrew Smith, 47th, 31:50, and Stephen Rabe, 69th, 36:11.
With a smile on his face, coach Stanley commented, "What a great effort by this team today. Borga is really coming around and Kaplan was good too. Smith and Rabe also had good performances with strong finishes. Beating Defiance was a big accomplishment for these guys!"
The women raced second and were not about to be outdone by the men. With a tightly-packed 1-5 of :44 seconds, the women came across the line at a rapid rate and near the front of the race. Out done only by Clayton State, S.C. (42) and Defiance (54) the Beavers finished all alone in 3rd place with a score of (97). Fourth place was Mt. Olive, S.C. (163).
Freshman Lauren "little" Borga took the lead reigns of this competition for the Beavers. She covered 5,000m in 21:00 to earn 14th place and a T-shirt given to the top 15 runners. Coming on with a strong performance, still coming back from injury, Jennifer Creamer ran her personal-best of the year at 21:11, good for 17th place. Also scoring for the women were Rachael Szydlowski, 19th, 21:16, Jennifer Niedermier, 21st, 21:27, and with the surprise performance of the day, Carrie Hudecek, 26th, 21:44. MaryAnna Morgan took 27th with a 21:45, Rachel Noirot, 52nd in a 23:31, and Alicia Stanko, 66th in a 24:55 were the other Bluffton runners.
"These women are beginning to run their races in a manner that will benefit the future. Right now we are running well with what we have and are still having problems with injuries. As long as we can stay healthy we will recover and perform our best when it really counts. Carrie (Hudedek) impressed me today," coach Stanley said. I had not idea that she was capable of such an effort off of such little training."