Mercer Women Place Second at Julius Johnson Invitational

Friday, September 23

Macon, Ga.

5:30 PM

Mercer University

Julius Johnson Invitational

Mercer Women Place Second at Julius Johnson Invitational

9/23/2016 10:17:00 PM | Women's Cross Country

MACON, Ga. – Senior Victoria Rogers continued an impressive senior season with a second-place finish at the Julius Johnson Invitational, leading the Mercer women's cross country team to a runner-up effort at the Georgia Industrial Children's Home on Friday.

Rogers ran the women's 5K in 19 minutes and 45.21 seconds, approximately six seconds behind Georgia Southern's Ashton Lord, who won the event in 19:39.28. The Eagles would go on to take the team victory as they split the top-10 with Mercer but claimed three of the top five finishes.

Courtney Czerniak (20:02.11), McKaylin Darsey (20:13.81), Kimberly Whiting (20:24.59) and Anna Grzeszczak (20:35.56) finished fifth, seventh, ninth and 10th, respectively to round out Mercer's top finishers. Every Mercer runner finished in less than 24 minutes and placed no higher than 27th overall.

COACH BAILEY'S TAKE
"I'm thankful for our freshman class," Bailey said. "We're very young on the women's side and I feel like we just ran out of ground tonight – if this were a 6K, we might have beat [Georgia Southern]. But, considering this is our freshmen's first collegiate 5K, I'm proud of them."

UP NEXT
Mercer travels to Oxford, Alabama next weekend to run in its second event of the season hosted by Jacksonville State. The Bears will look to continue their success from Friday into the Jacksonville State Foothills Invitational on Saturday, Oct. 1.

FOLLOW THE BEARS
For complete coverage of Mercer Cross Country, please visit the official home of Mercer Athletics at MercerBears.com.