Charlotte, N.C. – Men's Cross Country finished sixth on Saturday at the Conference Carolinas Championships led by Hayden Goode who marked the best finish among NGU runners. 
 
UNC Pembroke took home the league title followed by Belmont Abbey and Lees-McRae. Southern Wesleyan and Converse rounded out the top five. 
 
Hayden Goode finished fourth overall on Saturday and was NGU's only top-10 finisher with a time of 25:21. Goode earned a First-Team All-Conference nod with his performance. Mason White was North Greenville's next best finisher with a time of 26:33 (personal best). He finished the race in 30^th. 
 
Ryland Kowalski finished 37^th with a time of 26:46 followed by Thomas Shilling who finished just behind at 26:48 to finish 38^th . Both times were personal bests for Kowalski and Schilling. Matthew Heath finished 49^th with a time of 27:12. Cohen McDonald rounded out the top-50 finishes for NGU with a time of 27:12 (personal best) and a 49^th place finish. 
 
Solomon Canup finished with a time of 27:43 for a new personal best along with Chas Brewer who finished with a personal best time of 27:54. Nick Lavelle finished with a time of 28:34 while David Kushnir finished with a time of 30:57, both of which were new personal bests.
 
From Coach Stober 
"I'm really proud of how both teams ran today. Out of the 22 total runners that we had compete, 16 ran lifetime bests. Anytime you have that kind of individual success it's something to be extremely proud of. 

The men raced first and were once again led by Hayden Goode. Hayden finished fourth overall and earned first team all-conference honors. Mason White ran second for us and finished with a lifetime PB. Ryland Kowalski stepped up in a huge way and ran the race of his career, resulting in a lifetime PB. Ryland has been battling back and hamstring issues all season, but was able to put together the race of his life when it mattered the most. I thought he had the race of the day for us on the men's side. True freshman Thomas Schilling finished immediately behind Ryland as our fourth guy. Thomas has had an impressive freshman year and he was also able to run a lifetime PB today. Matthew Heath continued his streak as a top five runner for us, scoring for the first time in his career at a conference championship. I'm really proud of Matthew and how he's stepped up this season to be a top five guy for our men's team. Cohen MacDonald finished sixth for us, also with a lifetime PB. Solomon Canup continued on his success this season running as our seventh and finishing with a lifetime PB. Chas Brewer, Nick Lavelle, and David Kushnir also all finished with lifetime PBs as well. David continues his streak of PBs as he has gone five consecutive races with a new personal best. 
The men's race was a hard one for us to process as a team. Had you told me before the race that we would have eight guys run lifetime PBs, and that our number one would finish in the top five overall, I would've thought that we would be a top three team. Unfortunately that wasn't the case. There were a lot of other teams that just had had better days than we did. Our guys gave it everything they had and they performed well. It just wasn't enough today for what we were hoping for. These guys have endured a lot of adversity throughout the course of this season, but they have continued to give their best effort. I'm extremely proud of them and their effort today. 
 
The women raced second and were led by true freshman Cecily Anderton. Cecily has had a phenomenal freshman season…perhaps the best freshman season in program history for any female. Not only did she place sixth overall and earn first team all-conference honors, she absolutely obliterated the women's 6K school record by over 40 seconds. Cecily is a special talent and I'm excited to see what her future holds. Riley Nicholson continued her successful sophomore season finishing as our number two, and also earning second team all-conference honors by finishing eighth overall. Riley also ran faster than the previous school record and will now be number two all-time behind Cecily. Riley has had an incredible season, and I'm so proud of her. True freshman Riley Shope also ran faster than the previous school record. She finished third for our team and 12^th overall, earning second team all-conference honors. Riley has also had a phenomenal freshman season. Senior captain Kylie Futrell had a special day. In her last cross country conference meet, she ran a massive lifetime PB (by over a minute) and ran as our number four. I am so happy and excited for how Kylie performed today. She's meant a lot to our program over the past four years, and to see her run her final cross country conference championship the way that she did was special. Emma Bright is someone that I've seen much improvement from this season, and it finally paid off with a PB. Emma's whole mentality this season is what has allowed her to see the success that she's seen. For her to run a PB and finish top five for our team today is only going to give her more confidence moving forward. I'm happy to see where she's at now, and I'm excited to see what's to come. Paris Alsup has had a great season. She's run more miles than any girl on our team this year, and she's been reliable for us all season. She also ran a lifetime PB today. Kaylee Copeland is another girl that has seen tremendous improvement this season. She's gotten better every race and ran top seven for us today. I'm really proud of her and I'm excited to see where this improvement takes her. Beka and Zoie have both been battling shin splints all season, but they have both shown a lot of toughness and determination to get to (and through) today's race. I'm proud of them and I'm excited to see what they can do once they get healthy. Senior Kacey Miller ended her cross country career on positive note by running a lifetime PB and her best race (by far) all season. I'm really proud of Kacey and I'm glad that she was able to end her cross country career the way that she did.



In addition the all of the individual success that we had, our women's team set a new school record for fastest 6K team average. The old record (24:20) was from back in 2018 when our women's team finished runner-up at the conference meet. Today's school record was 23:45, more than a 30 second improvement. 
 
Again, I'm really proud of our teams. We look forward to one more opportunity to compete at the Region meet in a couple of weeks."
 
Next Up 
North Greenville will compete in the NCAA Southeast Region Championships.