On Friday, Nov. 11, the Southeast Missouri State women's cross country team competed at the NCAA Midwest Regional, and senior Megan Parks and junior Sydney O'Brien became the first duo since 1998 to finish in the top 50.
Throughout the entire season, coach Ryan Lane had high hopes for the team overall, including the leadership of Parks and O'Brien.
"This team is going to be really fun to watch," Lane said prior to the team's first race in August. "Megan and some other runners have a great opportunity to break a few records for the program."
And that they did. Parks and O'Brien finished the day with the top two 6K times in program history.
The team finished 16th out of 33 teams, missing the top-15 finish by just 20 points.
This same race made program history, finishing with the highest team average of 21 minutes and 49 seconds.
For Parks, this was her last cross country race since beginning her freshman year at Southeast. Parks was a sprinter before coming to Southeast in 2013, and she found the transition to the distance running challenging.
"I didn't really expect to run cross country in college at all actually," Parks said. "It was bittersweet to run that last race. I'm excited for the new chapters in my life and thankful for the time I got to run with my team."
Parks finished in 45th place with a time of 21 minutes and 14 seconds. She led the way for the team, finishing 54 spots higher than last year and giving her the second-highest finish in school history at a regional race.
O'Brien followed close behind Parks, finishing in 49th place with a time of 21 minutes and 17 seconds.
"It was such a cool race to be fighting until the finish with Meg," O'Brien said. "I had no idea that I would have such a good regional race, usually I am further behind her."
