Fueled by a pair of stellar season debuts, the Boston University cross country team impressed for the second consecutive week at the University of New Hampshire Invitational on Friday.
Junior Rich Peters easily claimed first place in his first race of the season with a time of 25:07.81, winning the eight-kilometer course by over a minute.
His win led the Terriers to finish first as a team, the second victory for the men in as many weeks.
“He loves to push himself,” said BU coach Bruce Lehane of Peters. “He has that tendency to want to challenge himself. He’s a smart guy … he does a great job.”
Freshman Kevin Thomas finished sixth with a time of 26:30.51, his strongest finish so far in his collegiate career.
Senior Michael Caputo placed seventh, clocking a time of 26:47.48, while freshman Alec Olson (ninth, 26:51.78) and sophomore Ben Ravetz (12th, 26:56.32) rounded out the scoring for the solid Terrier squad.
“The men are doing well,” Lehane said. “We have four guys who are pretty experienced, [Peters, Matt Paulson, Robert Gibson and Elliot Lehane], then we have a couple of freshmen who are doing a great job. Mike Caputo’s been doing a great job as a senior. We just need to get all of our guys well under 26 minutes, that’s real important. We need to move in that direction.“It’s nice to start with a couple of wins.”
The 35-point performance was good enough for a 15-point victory over second-place New Hampshire.
Junior Monica Adler also made her season debut on Friday, leading all Terrier women by finishing fourth with a time of 17:15.4.
“It’s good to have her out there for the first time,” Lehane said.
Freshman Shelby Stableford finished 11th in her second collegiate race, posting a time of 17:59.95.
Junior Danielle Bowen (15th, 18:12.98), sophomore Ashli Tagoai (26, 18:46.54), and junior Ally Brillaud (30th, 18:53.35) were the top BU finishers on the women’s side.
The women finished fourth as a team with a total of 80 points. Vermont claimed first place with a score of 39 points.
The University at Albany and New Hampshire finished second and third place, respectively.
The Terriers have this weekend off before resuming action on Sept. 28 at the Lehigh Invitational in Bethlehem, Pa.
“We held a couple guys out of this race, but next race we’ll put all our best people out there,” Lehane said.
The level of competition will go through the roof the next time out, we’ll be meeting some of the top teams around the country.
“The distance races kind of take a toll on you, so we’ll need some time to recover,” he said.
“Before you compete again, you have to lighten up a little. The flow of the season and the management of races is a critical part of bringing together a successful team.”
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
