SALISBURY, Md. – The Navy men's cross country team got its 2019 season underway on Saturday with strong results at the Salisbury Fall Classic as the squad left Winter Place Park with both team and individual titles. Paced by freshmen
Alex Rizzo (Bronxville, N.Y.) and
Garrison Clark (Severna Park, Md.), who placed first and second overall, the Mids finished atop the team standings with 22 points, 14 clear of second-place Seton Hall.
In the five-team event, Navy and Seton Hall finished first and second before the host Salisbury Sea Gulls placed third with 84 team points. Howard CC and Shenandoah rounded out the standings with scores of 127 and 134, respectively.
"Men dedicated to succeed together are hard to beat," remarked head coach
Aaron Lanzel. "The heat was a challenge today. As a whole, the freshmen showed their mettle to take on five miles of college-level running. Alex and Garrison were ready and led the way. Today was a great start to their careers."
Racing on an 8k course, Rizzo and Clark were the class of the 60-man field with respective times of 26:01.17 and 26:02.17. Seton Hall's Jesse Southard, the third-place finisher on Saturday was over 18 seconds behind the pair of Midshipmen at 26:20.65.
After Seton Hall's John Loeffel came in fourth,
Chase Rivera (Fr., Jacksonville, Fla.) and
Brett Brady (Fr., Phoenix, Ariz.) were the next two Navy runners to complete the race as they came in back-to-back, Rivera in fifth at 26:37.37 and Brady in sixth at 26:43.83.
The final two Mids to finish in the top-10 were
Derek Gess (Fr., Haddonfield, N.J.) in eighth with a time of 26:48.77 and
Mitchell Rome (Fr., Dallas, Pa.) in ninth, three seconds back at 26:51.68.
James Morgan (Fr., Florence, S.C.) and
Jack Mariano (Fr., Quincy, Mass.) just missed the top-10 as Morgan placed 11
th with a final time of 27:10.44, while Mariano was 12
th with a 27:11.58 effort.
Overall, 16 Midshipmen raced at Winter Place Park on Saturday, all of whom were freshmen making their collegiate debuts.
Navy will be back in competition next Saturday with racing at the Harry Lang Invitational in Hamilton, N.Y.
