RESULTS (.pdf):  Women's 6K  |  Men's 8K

SANTA ROSA, Calif- Carly McCready was Sonoma State's top finisher for the third consecutive race and Ashley Holtze crossed the line at a career-best time, helping the Seawolves to place third in the women's six-kilometer race of the second annual Sonoma State Invitational at Spring Lake Regional Park in Santa Rosa.

McCready finished ninth in the field of 61 runners, crossing the line at 23:33, just two seconds off of her career-best time of 23:31 in a six-kilometer race. She was followed by Holtze, who placed 13th with a time of 23:57, topping her previous career-best time in a 6K by three seconds.

Sablle Scheppmann ran the course in 24:24, placing 19th. Alicia Lueth (24:38), Kelli Bercier (24:47) and Veronica Kays (25:03) finished 24th, 25th and 26th, respectively, and Sammy Thomas placed 28th with a time of 25:16 to round out SSU's top seven finishers, which all count towards the final team score.

Laura Paneno ran the course in 25:32 (30th), followed by Debra Daubenspeck (25:38; 32nd), Meaghan O'Day (25:46; 33rd) and Rachel Borg (26:16; 34th). Hayley Sa placed 39th with a time of 27:34, outrunning 21 other competitors.

The Seawolves placed third as a team with 72 points, finishing behind team champion Cal State East Bay (36 points). The Pioneers egded out second place Cal State Monterey Bay by just one point, as the Otters accumulated 37 points. Holy Names (119) placed fourth behind Sonoma State, followed by Fresno Pacific (134) and Dominican (149). San Francisco State ran only four runners in Saturday's meet, as did Mills College and Humboldt State. Only teams with a minimum of five runners are calculated into the team results.

San Francisco State's Zuleima Jimenez was the top finisher in the women's 6K race, crossing the line in 21:57. Unattached runner Rosalind Smith finished second (22:08) ahead of Cal State Monterey Bay's Piper Delaney (22:35), Holy Names' Agnes SIlvestro (23:02) and Cal State East Bay's Tiffany Duffy (23:04).

In the men's eight-kilometer race, San Francisco State (37) ran away with with the team title, finishing ahead of Cal State Monterey Bay (55) by 18 points. Fresno Pacific (65), Holy Names (81) and Dominican (146) placed third, fourth and fifth, respectively.

Fresno Pacific's Brandon Croft finished first, coming in at a time of 26:07. Holy Names' Fernando Diaz (26:14), San Francisco State's Ryan Chio (26:28), Fresno Pacific's Kevin Barnard (26:32) and Cal State Monterey Bay's Cameron Cruse (26:40) rounded out the top five finishers in the men's race.

The Sonoma State women's cross country team will head south to San Diego next Saturday (Oct. 8) to compete in the UCSD Triton Classic in La Jolla. A week later, the Seawolves will run in the Bronco Invitational in Sunnyvale before returning home to host the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) Men's and Women's Cross Country Championships at Spring Lake Regional Park in Santa Rosa on Oct. 22.

For more information regarding the CCAA Cross Country Championships, please visit sonomaseawolves.com/2011ccaaxc. It will be the first conference championship event that Sonoma State has hosted since 2002.