The cross country team started off the season on a strong note, experiencing a handful of good runs in its opening competition. The women’s team placed second and the men took third place at the Old Nassau Run hosted by Princeton last weekend.

Junior Kaitlyn Tallman finished second in the collegiate point standings and third overall in a field of 145 runners with a time of 22:11.70. Sophomore Amanda Marino placed sixth in points and eighth overall with her time of 22:40.40. Villanova also had another runner in the Top 10 in points with sophomore Sarah Morrison’s time of 22:53.30. The women’s team ended up with five runners in the Top 25.

As a team, the women had an average time of 22:48.96 and a combined time of 1:54:04.80, less than one minute behind meet winner Georgetown.

Although there were not as many standout individual performances on the men’s side, the team did well as a whole, taking third place behind Princeton and Penn.

Sophomore Matt Wikler led the Wildcats with his time of 20:19, putting him 11th in the points standings and 17th overall. Sophomore Jason Apwah and junior Rudy Belko were the next two Wildcats to cross the finish lines as the 25th- and 26th-place finishers (17th and 18th in points) with their respective times of 20:30.30 and 20:30.40.

Both the men and women will be back in action when they run locally at the Haverford Invitational on Sept. 23.