STILLWATER, Okla. – New Mexico Cross Country passed its first big test of the season with flying colors at the OSU Cowboy Jamboree on Saturday morning, with Pamela Kosgei running away with a dominant individual win in her collegiate debut to lead the No. 21 Lobo women to first place in the team score and Habtom Samuel finishing as runner-up to lead a second-place showing for the No. 8 men.
Kosgei’s winning time of 19:50.0 was 43.5 seconds faster than the next finisher as she led a Lobo Top 7 that all packed into the overall Top 20 – Kosgei was followed by Natalie Bitetti (4th, 20:48.3), Klara Dess (6th, 20:56.8), and Mercy Kirarei (8th, 21:03.3) in the Top 10, with Hanna Bruckmayer (15th, 21:26.9), Tilly Simpson (17th, 21:30.0) and Sophia McDonnell (18th, 21:31.1) finishing behind them to round out the point-scoring.
The UNM women finished with 34 points in the team score to outpace the field, including No. 16 Oklahoma State.
The Lobo men finished second in the 8K race with 45 points to beat No. 22 Oregon and No. 24 Texas in the team score. Habtom Samuel led the charge with an individual runner-up finish (23:03.6) and the Lobos packed five runners into the Top 15, with Vincent Chirchir (9th, 23:54.3), Collins Kiprotich (10th, 23:58.0), Evans Kiplagat (11th, 24:09.7), and Rikus Van Niekerk (13th, 24:11.6) helping solidify the runner-up spot behind No. 1 Oklahoma State.
This story will be updated.
