Lobo Men Finish 14th at Nuttycombe; Women Finish 25th
MADISON, Wisc. – Habtom Samuel finished third overall to pace a 14th-place finish for New Mexico Men’s Cross Country while the Lobo women finished 25th in the team total behind a Top-25 finish from Nicola Jansen at the Nuttycombe Invitational Friday, with a combined five Top-100 individual finishes between the two squads at the most competitive regular-season meet of the year.
UNM’s 14th-place finish in the 8K “A” race is the best finish at Nuttycombe for the Lobo men since 2014, when they finished 12th.
After receiving votes in this week’s USTFCCCA National Coaches’ Poll, the Lobo men beat 10 teams ranked in the Top 30 nationally and four in the Top 15 in Friday’s team score – No. 4 Wisconsin, No. 12 Butler, No. 13 Stanford, No. 15 Eastern Kentucky, No. 18 Wake Forest, No. 19 Florida State, No. 23 Gonzaga, No. 25 Iona, No. 26 Michigan and No. 27 NC State – as well as five other teams that were receiving votes this week. They also outpaced all four Mountain West rivals – Air Force, Boise State, Utah State and Colorado State – scoring 56 fewer points than the Broncos (18th) and 60 fewer than the Falcons (19th).
Samuel followed up his splashy debut at Griak with another solid showing against significantly tougher competition, hanging with eventual champ Graham Banks of Harvard (23:23.4) and second-place finisher Nico Young of Northern Arizona (23:26.1). The true freshman never dipped lower than seventh place the whole way, moving up to the No. 3 spot at the 6K mark and holding it till the finish. Northern Arizona swept both the men’s and women’s team titles, with Harvard finishing sixth in the men’s team score.
Evans Kiplagat (18th, 23:45.5) and Lukas Kiprop (45th, 24:06.1) both rounded out the Lobos’ Top Three – UNM was one of only six teams in today’s Men’s 8K to place three runners in the Top 50. They were followed by Samuel Field (156th, 24:43.9) and Thomas Termote (215th, 25:08.6) to round out the point-scoring, with Jonathan Carmin (217th, 25:09.1), Yehonatan Haim (254th, 25:49.2) and Matthew Larkin (267th, 26:09.8) behind.
In the women’s 6K, Nicola Jansen placed 21st with a 20:18.8 finish and Klara Dess made it two Lobos in the top 100 with an 86th-place finish (20:56.6). They were followed by Semira Mebrahtu Firezghi (145th, 21:30.8), Sarah Eckel (149th, 21:33.0), Christina Nisoli (186th, 21:54.5), Tyler Schwartz (189th, 21:57.4) and Stefana Purkovic (244th, 23:05.0).
The Lobo women’s Top 5 collectively picked up 50 places over the final 2,000 meters to move up to No. 25 from No. 27, with Firezghi and Eckel moving up 65 places each over the final 4,000m.
UP NEXT / FOLLOW THE ACTION
The Lobos gear up for postseason racing at the Mountain West Championships on Oct. 27 in Boise, Idaho. Live Results and streaming will be available via GoLobos.com and the MW Network. Follow @UNMLoboTFXC on Instagram and @UNMLoboXCTF on X for live coverage, race content and more.