BETHLEHEM, Pa. --- The Elizabethtown College women's cross country team finished sixth at the NCAA Division III Mideast Regional Championship, held at Lehigh University's Goodman Campus on Saturday afternoon.
Blue Jay senior
Megan VanDenHengel and first-year student
Taryn Shank each captured All-Region honors at the meet, with VanDenHengel finishing eighth overall at 21:59.9 and Shank placing 19th in a time of 22:43.5.
VanDenHengel is in position to earn an at-large bid to the NCAA Division III Cross Country Championships when the selections are announced on Sunday afternoon. Elizabethtown has had at least one runner compete at the NCAA championships in each of the last five years, with the team qualifying for nationals in 2004, 2006 and 2007.
Sarah Merusi finished 52nd overall for the Blue Jays with a time of 23:45.4,
Kathryn Howser was 66th with a time of 23:56.3, and
Teresa Beshore was the final scorer for Elizabethtown as her time of 24:39.4 was good for 114th place.
Johns Hopkins University won the team championship with a score of 109 points, finishing just ahead of Centennial Conference rival Dickinson College which totaled 113 points. Haverford College was third with 146 points, followed by Grove City College (175 points), Gettysburg College (195 points) and Elizabethtown (259 points).
Rounding out the top 10 were Carnegie Mellon University (267 points), Allegheny College (292 points), Swarthmore College (298 points) and the University of Scranton (316 points).
Jenn Cronin of Lebanon Valley College was the individual race winner with a time of 21:39.2 over the 6,000-meter course. Emily Lipman of Haverford was second at 21:44.4, with Kerrin Epstein of Gettysburg in third at 21:45.4.