SEATTLE (Sept. 7) -- Nathanael Castle of Seattle Pacific University broke-up a perfect score by Washington by taking second place at the Emerald City Invitational, the season's first cross country race Saturday at Lower Woodland Park.

Castle (Sr., Gooding, Id.) was the only non-Husky among the 8000-meter race's top seven men's finishers. Seattle Pacific's lone NCAA quaifier a year ago, he was runner-up to Washington's Todd Arnold in 26 minutes, 2.4 seconds, just ahead of UW harrier Ben Koss, who was third in 26:04.3. Arnold won easily in 25:46 and the UW scored 16 points to retain the team title.

Tim LeCount (Fr., Battle Ground, Wa.) of SPU took 23rd overall in 28:04. The Falcons were sixth with 140 points. Seattle University, the host, was first among Great Northwest Athletic Conference teams, placing third with 106.

For the women, the Huskies' Laura Hodgson coasted to victory in 17:40.6 over 5000 meters. The top scorer for Seattle Pacific was Ruth Hawkinson (Sr., Roy, Wa./Yelm), who was 24th in 20:04.3.

Washington won the team women's title with 22 points, followed by Northwest College (44). SPU, with many of its top projected scorers, was sixth with 165.

Next Saturday the Falcons send a select handful of runners to the regional preview in Fresno while the balance of the squads compete at Central Washington.

MEN--8,000 meters
Team Scores: 1-Washington, 19; 2-Puget Sound, 94; 3-Seattle, 106; 4-Central Washington, 116; 5-Western Washington, 130; 6-Seattle Pacific, 140; 7-Saint Martin¹s, 154; 8-Evergreen State, 235.
Medalists: 1-Todd Arnold, UW, 25:46.74; 2-Nathaniel Castle, SPU, 26:02.4; 3-Ben Koss, UW, 26:04.3; 4-Michael Kiter, UW, 26:18.47; 5-Mark Mandi, UW, 28:18.47.
Other SPU scorers: 23-Tim LeCount, 28:04.7; 35-Paul Mach, 28:47.8; 39-Scott Van Hess, 29:05.7; 46-Andrew Kamikawa, 29:43.8; 50-Aaron Libadisos, 30:04.9.

WOMEN--5,000 meters
Team Scores: 1-Washington, 22; 2-Northwest College, 44; 3-Central Washington, 101; 4-Western Washington, 125; 5-Puget Sound, 154; 6-Seattle Pacific, 165; 7-Saint Martin¹s, 266; 8-Seattle, 356.
Medalists: 1-Laura Hodgson, UW, 17:40.6; 2-Jamie Gibbs, UW, 17:58.26; 3-Kate Spigel, UW, 18:21.81; 4-Ashlee Vincent, NWC, 18:30.86; 5-Korinda Godwin, NWC, 18:39.21.
Other SPU scorers: 24-Ruth Hawkinson, 20:04.3; Sarah Kraybill, 20:18.9; 32-Josie Lavin, 20:27.5; 35-Ruth Harbaugh, 20:37.2; 45-Kirsten Bjork, 21:01.6.