The Northland LumberJills competed in the 2007 UMAC Cross Country Conference meet hosted by St. Scholastica this past Saturday. The Jill's have been led all season by freshman Amanda Strick and senior Melissa McNell.  On Saturday, the pair ran perfect race strategy to take 6th and 7th place at the conference meet. “Amanda and Melissa really put together a smart, gutsy race.” said Head Coach Dave Beeksma. “It was exciting to watch!” With a stiff wind and a very soggy race course, Strick and McNell knew they would need each other to pace and draft. Starting slowly, they worked their way through the pack. At the first mile, they were running together in the 23rd and 24th positions. With each mile they kept passing the competition until they were in the top ten. “Going into this race I knew that those two had the ability to be top ten. When they moved up to the 9 and 10 spots without much race distance left I thought that was where they would end up.  But, they just kept cranking and before we knew it they were at the 6 and 7 spot. It was incredibly exciting. They moved on the 5th spot with about 300 meters to go, but simply ran out of gas.” Comments Coach Beeksma. “It was a flat course, but with all of the rain we have had it was like running on a sponge. Almost every other team ran up to 1 to 1:30 slower than their previous best times. In contrast, Amanda dropped her time by almost two minutes and Melissa dropped her time by 30 seconds.” Strick and McNell were followed by sophomore Jessica Swierczynski (30:18), freshman Cassie Bodette (30:45), and first time runner Laura Ehlen (32:30) to complete their team score. First time runners Katie Musick (32:30) and Samantha Schneid (37:00) rounded off the top seven Northland competitors.

The women’s team has struggled this year with illness and injury. Francesca Pascale, the top freshman coming into the season and potential #1 runner on the team has been held out due to a hip injury. “Francesca is a very talented and dedicated team member who has been frustrated by her injury. She would easily have joined Amanda and Melissa as an All-Conference runner.” States Coach Beeksma another freshman who is a varsity runner, Ashley Stefaniw, has also struggled with injury and did not compete at the conference, meet. The Jill's finished 6th at the meet with 115 points. “Going into the season we had the runners in place to get a team score around 60 points, but the illness and injury factor really hurt us. We are not a deep enough team yet,” Says Coach Beeksma. That dept will come with time as the team grows. They will loose only two of the 12 members to graduation this year and will have no Seniors on the team next year.

St. Scholastica won the women’s team championship with freshman Juila Curry taking the individual crown. The Jill's final meet of the season will be November 10th at the NCAA Midwest region meet hosted by the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh.