Kolka Leads Tigers To 5th Place Finish
Springfield, OH- Wittenberg hosted the NCAC Preview, the first home cross country meet for the Tigers since 2018. Wittenberg went head-to-head with eleven teams, six being NCAC schools. The women's team had competition with two top ten regionally ranked teams, beating out both of them along with four NCAC schools for a team finish of third place. The men were led by freshman Conor Kolka for a fifth-place team finish, beating out four NCAC schools.
The women were led by freshman Corin Turkovich who crossed the line in sixth place with a time of 24:04.3. Following behind Turkovich was Lauren Welker in ninth at 24:18.8. In third for the Tigers was freshman, Megan Keys with a 16th place finish and time of 24:49.9. Wittenberg's fourth and fifth runners were Elizabeth Canright and Gracie Hubbs to give the women a third-place overall finish, beating out #5 Oberlin and #6 Baldwin Wallace.
The men were also led by a freshman with Conor Kolka getting his first collegiate top ten finish in an 8K. Kolka finished at 26:54.0 for a seventh-place finish. Following Kolka was junior Cullen Sainey with a 11th place finish and time of 27:14.0. Competing in the third spot for the Tigers was freshman, Ephram Evans at 27:50.4. The Red & White's fourth and fifth runners came in under 29 minutes with Evan Cordle coming in at 28:17.8 and Andrew Reese at 28:42.3. The men had an overall finish of 5th out of 11.
Head Coach Paris Hilliard said "today was a great day to host conference preview, we were a little short-handed with our top guy out and third best female out but they did a great job competing. We're really excited about the future and ready to go next week at All-Ohio."
The Tigers will return to action on September 17th at Cedarville University for the All-Ohio Championships.