Oct. 5, 2007

Contact: Greg Murphy

DELAWARE, Ohio - Cleveland State ran to a 31st place finish out of 44 teams at the 2007 All-Ohio Championships on Friday afternoon at the Methodist Theological School. Ohio Wesleyan served as the host school.

"It was brutally hot today," head coach Joe Jaketic said. "The conditions were not ideal to compete, but the team gave it everything they had. We practice at 6:30 a.m. each morning, so we are not as accustomed to the heat as some of the other teams train later in the day.

"I was pleased with the way the team grinded it out on the course today. This is a tough event and the team rallied around each other once again."

Freshman Allison Craine was CSU's top finisher for the sixth time in as many races this season as she placed 129th overall with a time of 21:39. She was followed by sophomore Colleen Conway who was 167th in 22:22.

Sophomore Alison Ohliger placed 174th in 22:42, while junior Audrey Piotrowski was 207th in 23:26 and freshman Jordan Hoile recorded a 220th place showing with a time of 23:48 to round out CSU's scorers.

Junior Melisa Mazanac also ran for the Vikings and tallied a 244th place finish with a time of 24:58.

Sophomore Julie Piotrowski was CSU's seventh starter, but was forced to drop out of the race due to the heat.

"It's to bad the elements were like this today," Jaketic said. "But you can't control the weather."

Miami (OH) won the team title with 75 point. Ohio (80), Akron (100), Cincinnati (103) and Cedarville (121) rounded out the top five, while the Vikings finished with 897 points.

CSU is scheduled to return to action next weekend at the Falcon Invitational in Bowling Green, Ohio. The race is scheduled to begin at 10:45 am.

"The team is looking forward to running on a fast course at Bowling Green next weekend," Jaketic said. "We've run there once already this season and we are looking forward to going back.