WATERFORD, Conn. -- The Mount Holyoke College cross country team placed 15th out of 24 teams at the NCAA Division III Mideast Regional Championships Saturday at Harkness State Park, led by senior captain Tessa Lancaster's outstanding finish.
Out of a highly competitive region in which the top seven teams may receive invitations to next Saturday's NCAA Championships, Mount Holyoke scored 429 points to place ahead of regional rivals such as Salve Regina (443), New Paltz State (506), Eastern Connecticut State (512), Springfield (513) and Plattsburgh State (594). It is Mount Holyoke's fifth straight top-15 regional finish.
Williams won the team scoring with 59 points, followed by a densely packed next five teams in RPI (110), Amherst (110), Vassar (111), Middlebury (112) and Connecticut College (116).
Lancaster (Mansfield, Mass.) paced the Lyons, placing 55th among 182 runners overall with a time of 23:02.5 over the 6-kilometer course.
Senior Kim Beaver (Agawam, Mass.) followed for Mount Holyoke in 79th (23:36.9), with senior Elizabeth Gerbi (Orono, Maine) in 88th (23:55.3), and senior Greta Trapp (La Crosse, Wis.) in 95th (24:07.4). Sophomore Dalia Luckhardt (Cerritos, Calif.) finished 117th overall (25:04.5) as the Lyons' final team scorer, with sophomore Anjali Phadnis (San Marcos, Calif.) and junior Katie Earle (East Kingston, N.H.) 137th as the team's scoring displacers.
