Bolivar, Mo. – The SBU women's cross-country team opened the 2026 season in dominant fashion Saturday morning, winning the SBU Bearcat XC Invite with
22 points, 25 points ahead of second-place and Nationally ranked, Missouri Southern with 47.SBU placed five runners inside the top seven and nine inside the top 15.
Junior
Natalie Gerdes led the charge, capturing the individual title in the women's 5K with a time of
18:15.68. Senior
Kiersten Potter gave the Bearcats another podium finisher, taking third overall in
18:52.38.
SBU's freshman class made an immediate impact as
Abigail Tague, Lina Schitz and Audrey Richter finished fifth, sixth and seventh, respectively. Tague crossed the line in
19:30.94, Schitz followed in
19:33.52, and Richter finished in
19:41.84. Those three finishes helped secure SBU's five scoring runners inside the top seven.
The depth continued behind them with
Kadence Wallace finishing 10th,
Riley Arnold 11th,
Emily Young 13th and
Kristin Probst 15th. In total, nine Bearcats finished among the first 15 runners across the line.
SBU will look to take that momentum with them into their next meet on September 19
th at the MSSU Stampede.
