Banana Slugs sweep Cross Country Conference Championships

Saturday, October 28

Baylands Park- Sunnyvale, CA

10:00 AM

UC Santa Cruz Athletics

Coast-To-Coast Conference Championship

10/28/2023 3:00:00 PM | Women's Cross Country

SUNNYVALE-- UC Santa Cruz Cross Country pulled off a double "three-peat" at the Coast-To-Coast Conference Championships at Baylands Park in Sunnyvale.

Both the men and women won their respective titles for the third year in a row.
UC Santa Cruz went 1-2-3 in the men's 8K. Eric Jackson repeated as Conference Individual Champion with a time of 24:05.8. Casey Orton was second with a PR of 24:19.6 and Raymond Ingersoll took third in 25:07.8.
Two more Banana Slugs were in the top eight to earn First Team All-Conference. Luke Holland was fifth in 25:14.1 and Eric Anderson was sixth in 25:16.4. That made UC Santa Cruz's team score a 17 to comfortably distance themselves from second place Christopher Newport (58 points).
Five Banana Slugs earned Second Team All-Conference. Camden Jaureguy (25:33), Holden Spencer (25:34), Camden Hebert (25:44) and Nick Sciole (25:48) finished ninth through twelfth. Dylan Cronin was 15th in 26:03.

Orton and Jackson at the start of the race — *Orton and Jackson one mile into the race (UCSC Sports Information)*

The women's 6K race was even more dominant, as the Banana Slugs took the top seven positions and scored a perfect 15 points to take the crown. Helena Janku was Conference Champion after crossing the tape in 21:55, a new PR which moved her to eighth all-time on the school record list.
Elena Stanciu was second in 22:19.9, and Hanna Hekkanen was third 3.6 seconds after. The next Banana Slugs to cross were Riley Martel-Phillips (22:30.3), Kenzie Seymour (22:36.2), Cheryl Chuang (22:43.5), and Frieda Cedillo (22:45.1).
"We had faith in each other and we were all pumped up for the race," Janku said. "We were aware of having our teammates close by and using each other to encourage better racing. It's a good thing to fall back on, especially going into championship season."
Four more Banana Slugs were in the Top 15 and earned Second Team All-Conference honors: Faith Dyogi (9th, 22:55), Luna Centeno (11th, 22:58), Andrea Gallardo (14th, 23:14) and Emma Wirz (15th, 23:16).