NACOGDOCHES, Texas – With junior Mark Dotson leading a very young Northwestern State squad, the Demons improved on last year's finish in Monday's 2011 Southland Conference Cross Country Championships, while the Lady Demons had some personal best marks as senior Lawana Perkins once again topped the NSU scorecard.
 
With Dotson setting the pace by finishing with a 27:29.2 time for 46^th overall, the NSU men also got scoring by freshmen Alex Hebert (57^th, 28:20.5) and Albert Gladney (58^th, 28:31.2), and sophomores Travis Plumb (66^th, 29:19.4) and Zach Burns (68^th, 29:23.3). NSU's other entries were junior Chris Lanier (73^rd, 30:16.2), freshman John Broughton (78^th, 31:15.1) and junior Nathanial McReynolds (79^th, 32:01.6).
 
The NSU men improved one spot to 10^th in the 12-team standings, scoring 295 points, topping state rivals Southeastern Louisiana (303) and Nicholls (337). The Northwestern women shared 11^th place with Southeastern at 308.
 
The Lady Demons got personal record performances from junior Ali Fontenot (55^th, 23:58.7) and freshman Aly Coughlin (62^nd, 24:18.2), the next two finishers behind Perkins (34^th, 23:12.7). Completing the scoring for the NSU women were junior Kirstie Jones (78^th, 25:37.4) and junior Becca Meehan (79^th, 26:15.5) with track sprinters Consuela Lindsy (80^th, 27:37.6) and Constance Seibles (81^st, 27:46.0) also running for the Lady Demons, who lost last year's top runner, Karensa Ellis, to a foot injury early this fall.
 
“We got good efforts from everybody, and ran a much improved average time (24:40.5) over a course we ran a month ago,” said first-year women's coach Adam Malloy. “All the runners met their goals and that's all I could ask.”
 
Leon Johnson, the veteran men's coach, said Dotson twisted his ankle during the race, which slowed him down and curtailed NSU's hopes of passing Central Arkansas for ninth.
 
“We're a very young team with three freshmen, three sophomores and just two juniors,” he said. “I am sure Mark would have done much better without the bad luck, and maybe we could have moved up another place. It was progress and we'll look for more improvement next year.”
 
The Lamar men and the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi women won the team titles, with Lamar claiming its sixth straight championship. A&M-Corpus Christi junior Patrick Kimeli claimed his second consecutive men's individual title, while Stephen F. Austin junior Lauren Smith won the women's crown.
 
The Lamar men scored 29 points, matching the lowest score since the Cardinals won the title in 2008. UTSA finished second, its best team finish since it won the title in 1997, with 63 points, while A&M-Corpus Christi came in third with 91 points.  Stephen F. Austin placed fourth (100) and McNeese State (134) came in fifth.
 
Kimeli, a native of Eldoret, Kenya, posted a 24:50 time over the 8K course to win his second consecutive individual title, joining former Islander Shadrack Songok (2006-07) as the only runners to win the Southland cross country 8K event in consecutive years.
 
The A&M-CC women scored 65 points to win their fourth cross country title in the past five years. UTSA came in second with 70 points, followed by Lamar (92), Texas State (115) and Texas-Arlington (123). SFA, the defending conference champions, finished sixth with 156 points.
 
Smith finished the 6K run in 20:58, a full 45 seconds ahead of A&M-Corpus Christi senior Kristine Burciaga.

Full men's results

Full women's results