Freshmen Lead the Way for Cross Country in Season Opener

Saturday, August 31

Conway, Ark.

8:30 AM

University of North Texas

UCA Bear XC Invitational

8/31/2024 10:07:00 AM | Track & Field/XC

Aidan Shannon, Destiny Hernandez paced the Mean Green in their collegiate debuts

CONWAY, Ark. – A young group of runners made their collegiate debuts to kick off the season for the UNT cross country team at the UCA Bear XC Invitational Saturday.

The women's team hit the course first and were led by Destiny Hernandez who placed 14^th overall in the women's three-mile run. Fellow true freshmen Maggie Cuppett and Ella Bengtsson trailed close behind Hernandez placing 17^th and 18^th, respectively. UNT's six runners finished within 10 spots of each other with Hernandez at the front and Brenna Zerby coming in 23^rd place to secure a third-place finish in the team results.

The men's team saw similar results as four of the five participants were true freshmen. Aidan Shannon paced the group, collecting a top-10 finish with a time of 14:51.97. Following Shannon was David Kalwahali (11^th), Matthew Montgomery (13^th), Hunter Hendry (15^th) and Hardy Swann (21^st).

"I felt really solid about the results that we put out there today," head coach Erik Stevens said. "We ran a really young group coming off of a hard workout effort yesterday. They executed the plan that we needed to today, built all the way through the race and showed that we're a capable group of young, talented athletes that can continue to build throughout the year. Having a third place finish with five or six of our top projected runners sitting out until later in the season is a great start for us."

The Mean Green will travel to Wichita, Kan., for the J.K. Gold Classic on Saturday, Sept. 7 before getting into the heart of their schedule.