The Nebraska Wesleyan men's and women's cross country teams weathered muddy conditions to finish 15th and 10th respectively at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse Jim Drews/Tori Neubauer Invitational Saturday morning (Oct. 13) in West Salem, Wisconsin.

It was the third competition of the season for the Prairie Wolves and Coach Bulling was very pleased with the improvement from both squads from their last time out. This performance should give NWU confidence heading to the month of November for the conference and regional meets.

Erin Kautz led the efforts for the Prairie Wolves women as she placed 32nd overall in the field of 433 total runners. She covered the 6,000-meter course in 23:05.6. Two other top performers for the NWU women were Gabi Jenkins and Ali Tewes. Jenkins and Tewes finished within a .10 of a second of each other as Jenkins was 69th and Tewes 70th.

In the men's race, senior Johnny Rutford was the top individual finisher for NWU as he was 27th overall in a men's race that had 461 runners. Rutford ran a time of 25:59.3 on the 8K course to earn his top 30 finish.