Rice all comers meet 2023 results

HOUSTON – The University of Houston men's cross country team finished second and the women finished third at the 46th running of the Rice Invitational at Rice University on Friday.

"That was a good meet tonight for the Cougars," cross country head coach Ray Stanfield said. "We had great front running again by Claire (Meyer) and Brandon (Seagreaves). On the men's side, adding Devin (Vallejo-Bannister) to the mix this week was nice and proves that we are stronger this year."

  Senior Claire Meyer set the tone in the women's race for Houston, pacing the ladies with a 14 minutes 10.4 second time across the 4k course, fast enough to finish third overall and first among American Athletic Conference competitors at the meet.

  For the second-straight meet, junior Macie Ellis crossed second for Houston, crossing the tape in 10:29.7, good for seventh overall. All five of the Cougars' five scoring competitors placed inside the top 15.

Seagreaves, who along with Meyer, has been the first Cougar finisher for his respective gender in the first two meets, finished fifth overall at 20:13.3 in the 4-mile race. The senior looked over his shoulder at the finish line and quickly greeted Branch Cox and Devin Vallejo-Bannister, who finished seventh and eighth, respectively.

  Both teams ran in compact groups, with four of Houston's five male scoring runners finishing before a Tulane competitor finished, and all five finishing inside the top 25. There were 41 male competitors who finished the race.

UP NEXT
The Cougars will take a week off from competition, but head up to Fayetteville, Ark. for the Chile Pepper Invitational on Sept. 30.

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Players Mentioned

Macie Ellis

DistanceJunior

Claire Meyer

Distance5' 6"Senior

Devin Vallejo-Bannister

Distance6' 0"Graduate Student

Branch Cox

DistanceSophomore

Players Mentioned

Macie Ellis

JuniorDistance

Claire Meyer

5' 6"SeniorDistance

Devin Vallejo-Bannister

6' 0"Graduate StudentDistance

Branch Cox

SophomoreDistance