DeKALB — The NIU cross country team kicked off their season with a meet in the University of Iowa Hawkeye Cross Country Invitational Friday evening, putting two team members in the top 50 out of 121 finalists. 

As a team, NIU finished in last place as they just were not fast enough as a collective to bypass the other ten teams that were at the invitational. 

Junior Brooke Lyte finished 44th with a time of 15:04.7 and her freshman teammate Katelyn Robbins finished right behind her in 45th place with a time of 15:05.3. 

The Huskies also had four other team members finish within the top 100 with sophomore Julia Finegan coming in 70th, sophomore Victoria Robinson coming in 86th, freshman Joy Jackson coming in at 87th and senior Hannah Ricci coming in at 96th. 

Even though the Huskies struggled in their first meet, head coach Jaime Moreno said there’s a lot to work on but looked at the positives that came out of the event. 

“We have a lot of work to do but I like where the girls are at right now and it was definitely a positive race for us,” Moreno said in a Sept. 3 NIU news release.

Iowa State University won the invitational while Northwestern University finished second, the University of Iowa third, Illinois State University fourth and the University of Northern Iowa rounded out the top five. 

The NIU cross country team’s next meet will be at Illinois State’s Redbird Invite at 5 p.m. on Sept. 17 in Normal, Illinois where the Huskies will look to improve as a collective and put forth a better effort to avoid the same results that took place at the Iowa Invitational.