Women’s cross country had its worst showing of the season, finishing 27 of 28 at the Roy Griak Invitational on

Saturday.

The Huskies traveled to Falcon Heights, Minn., for their first 6K of 2013.

NIU beat out last-place Creighton University in the final standings.

NIU head coach Greg Hipp knew the field was going to be hard going in, but he was not pleased with the way the meet turned out.

“It was a frustrating performance and we have to compete much better than that,” Hipp said. “It was far off of our potential.”

The competition was fierce with seven of the teams ranked nationally. No. 5-ranked Arizona Wildcats took the meet crown with a score of 48, having four runners in the top 10.

Arizona State junior Shelby Houlihan took first place out of 300 runners with a time of 20:35.45

NIU was led by sophomore Ali Olson, who finished the invitational in 23:04 to take 151st place out of 300.

After Olson, there was a dropoff in NIU finishers with the rest of the team finishing in the bottom 100.

Junior Meghan Heuer took 218th place, timing in at 23:47.35, while junior team captain Jamie Burr crossed the finish line at 23:53.50 to take 226th.

Leah Raffety, who was strong in NIU’s first meet of the season, finished right behind Burr to take 227th with a time of 23:54.45.

Claire McAuley, one of two seniors in NIU’s group, ended the race with a time of 24:09.30 to take 244th.

Hipp will look for more from NIU next week.

“We have to improve a few things in our approach to racing,” Hipp said. “We are not taking advantage of our fitness; we need to find out what the missing pieces mentally are to compete at our potential.”

The three freshmen of NIU’s squad finished in the bottom 50 with Carly Pederson taking 263rd place, finishing the 6L course in 24:41.95, and Hannah Savage at 24:42.25 to take 264th.

NIU’s final freshman, Rachel Shoemaker, timed in at 25:16.30 for a 279th-place finish, and in her first meet of the season senior Alexis Capps was right behind Shoemaker in 280th at 25:20.15.

NIU has three weeks off competition before it returns to the course Oct. 18 for the Bradley Classic.