The Falcons Online -- Seattle Pacific University Athletics

Final Conference Cross Country Tune-Up Set For Bellingham
SPU Women Harriers Ranked 24th In Nation
October 8, 2003

Complete Weekly Release PDF Version
2003 Men's Results	2003 Women's Results
2003 Men's Roster	2003 Women's Roster

Trail Mix

Heritage will use this week's results to determine her entries for the GNAC meet, which will be 6k for women and 8k for men. At the conference race only 10 individuals per team are permitted. She noted that this will also be the first 6k and 10k races for her freshmen. The NCAA West Regional extends to 10k for the men...Expected back this week are Josie Lavin (Jr., Bremerton, Wa.) and Karen Dickson (Fr., El Dorado Hills, Ca./Oak Ridge), the Nos. 2-3 scorers this season. Both were held out last week...LeCount was 14th and the men third behind Western and Central at last year's Western Washington Invitational. The women were fourth a year ago. They last won the meet in 1981 and have been runners-up four times since 1984.

Stretching out. The finish line will be pushed way, way back this weekend as the Seattle Pacific University cross country teams run through their final dress rehearsal for the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Championships. The 30th annual Western Washington Invitational will attract the Falcons and others who are seeking to stretch their legs for the upcoming conference and regional meets. This is the first women's 6000-meter course and men's 10k event of the season. Next week the harriers are idle while training for the GNAC Championships, Oct. 25 in Monmouth, Ore.

Movin' on up. Surprisingly, Seattle Pacific dropped down five spots to 24th in this week's NCAA Division II women's rankings. But Coach Doris Heritage is more interested in the regional landscape since the top three women's teams qualify for the NCAA Championships. Currently, SPU is No. 3 in the West Region, behind Chico State and UC San Diego. The regional meet will be Nov. 8 in Pomona, Ca. The Falcons last ran at nationals in 1999, taking sixth overall.

Coming off a win. The women got their first scored win last week, edging Western Washington in a dual meet, 20-41, at the Silver Lake Invitational. Despite missing two of their top three scorers, the Falcons took another step in developing their depth. At the front of the pack, Jamie Witt (Jr., Folsom, Ca.) took second place overall for the second week in a row, finishing the 3-mile course in 18 minutes, 19 seconds. Kathleen Memi won the race in 17:56. Witt, who purposely went out slow, reeled in several competitors over the last mile and has now finished third or better in each of her four outings this fall. Abby Groth (So., Roseburg, Or./Glide) returned after missing the previous race and was fifth overall in 19:25 and Ruth Harbaugh (So., Gig Harbor, Wa.) was sixth in 19:26. Kirsten Bjork (Sr., Olympia, Wa./Black Hills) ran eighth in 19:47 seconds and Becky Knox (So., Denver, Co.) cinched the outcome, taking 11th in 20:05-four places ahead of the final WWU scorer.

Not so fast. While the women were deployed up north, the men's squad faced a much larger and more difficult field at the Willamette Invitational. Tim LeCount (So., Battle Ground, Wa.) finished 25th in the men's open division, by far his lowest finish of the season. He ran the 8000 meters in 25:11 and was fourth among runners from the GNAC. Chico State's Tyler Graff was first among 250 men in 24:15, and the Wildcats easily won the team title. Seattle Pacific was 15th.

Silver Lake Invitational/Western Washington Dual Results
Women's Team Scores: 1-Seattle Pacific 25, 2-Western Washington 32
Top Individuals: Kathleen Memi, 17:56
SPU Scorers: 2-Witt, 18:19; 5-Groth, 19:25; 6-Harbaugh, 19:26; 8-Bjork, 19:47; 11-Knox, 20:05; 14-Preboski, 20:15; 15-McCoy, 20:15; 17-Huntington, 20:18; 22-Jensen, 20:27; 23-Marsh, 20:39; 25-Daringer, 21:04; 41-Chatfield, 23:21

Willamette Invitational (8k)
Men's Team Scores: 1- Chico State 45, 2-Eastern Oregon 58, 3-UC San Diego 99, 4-Willamette 161, 5-Puget Sound 191, 6-Humboldt State 205, 7-Western Oregon 224, 8-Concordia 228, 9-Alliant International 251, 10-British Columbia 271, 11-Lewis-Clark State 341, 12-Point Loma 373, 13-Northwest Nazarene 386, 14-Saint Martin's 388, 15-Seattle Pacific 429, 16-Southern Oregon 441, 17-Pacific Lutheran 445, 18-George Fox 454, 19-Vanguard 476, 20-Pacific 556, 21-Chaminade 611, 22-Lewis & Clark 638, Linfield 642, 24-Evergreen 717, 25-Western Baptist 737, Oregon Tech 751.
Top Individuals: 1-Tyler Graff, Chico State, 24:15.
SPU finishers: 25-LeCount, 25:11; 57-Mach, 25:55; 126-Libadisos, 27:04; 136-Bostrom, 27:20; 161-Gavarski, 27:42; 162-Bjella, 27:43; 178-Phillips, 28:06; 195-O'Connor, 28:28

Coaching staff. Coach Doris Heritage (25th year) has guided the SPU women to 10 top-10 national finishes and conference titles in six of the last nine years. In 1996 the Falcons won the West Region and her teams finished as high as second in the AIAW (1979, '80) and third in the NCAA (1983, '86) championships. Nineteen harriers have been All-America, including two national champions. The world's premier distance runner of the Sixties, she won five consecutive world cross country titles from 1967-71, and was a member of the 1968 and '72 U.S. Olympic teams. Heritage has coached the U.S. world cross country championship team, served as an assistant at many international meets, including the 1988 Olympics, and is a six-time women's conference coach of the year at SPU. In July of 2002 she was inducted into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame. Heritage was already a member of the U.S. Track & Field and U.S. Track Coaches halls of fame. Assisting Heritage as coaches again this season will be Erika (Botha) Daligcon and Lane Seeley. Daligcon ran for the Falcons from 1995-96. Seeley is a physics professor at Seattle Pacific.

Missing links. For the latest and best information on Seattle Pacific University athletics, stay where you're at -- on The Falcons Online. For updated standings and statistics, see the Great Northwest Athletic Conference web site.