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sports
Season ends with
beginning
By Mike Haubrich
On-line Forty-Niner
Long Beach State
didn't have a great finish at the NCAA West Regional Cross
Country meet Saturday in Tucson, Ariz. -- the men's team finished
15th, the women 17th -- but The Beach took something more
valuable out of the season-ending contest, according to LBSU
Head Coach Andy Sythe
"This is the beginning of building our program,"
Sythe said. "The team now has knowledge of what to expect
next year and the level of work they need to do to compete
at this meet. The biggest accomplishment from this meet is
what we got out of it for next year."
Top finishers for the 49ers were sophomores Drea Palacio,
who finished 67th overall at 23:42.5 over the 6-kilometer
course, and Aaron Durham, who finished 73th overall at 33:54.5
over 10 kilometers.
"Drea was injured [last week] and gave her strongest
effort," Sythe said of Palacio, who finished 92nd at
this meet last year. "She was capable of the top 25,
but we'll take 68th. It's an improvement over last year."
Sythe said that despite finishing as the top 49er, Durham
thought he could have done more.
"Aaron felt he could have done better individually,"
Sythe said, "but was more concerned with the team finish.
The best story Saturday, according to Sythe, was the finish
of Beach freshman Matt Bates.
"Matt was probably the most unlikely guy to finish where
he did [89th at 34:19.1]," Sythe said. "He is an
elite 800 [meter] runner and ran his first [10K Saturday].
Matt made a choice to push it whole race and not just at end."
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