SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Junior runner Hannah Rice (East Aurora, N.Y./East Aurora) picked up the first race victory of her career today, leading the Daemen College women's cross country team to a first-place finish out of four competing teams at the Le Moyne Alumni Short Course Invitational.  The team victory today marked Daemen's first since winning the United States Collegiate Athletic Association (USCAA) National Championship meet on November 8, 2013.

Rice finished the short 4,000-meter race in 16:39.87 to top a field of 28 entrants.  In addition to her first-ever win, the performance today marked Rice's fifth top-10 finish in 12 career races.  Her previous highest finish was a fifth-place showing here last year at the same event.

After Rice, it was fellow junior Mackenzie Donahue (East Aurora, N.Y./East Aurora) finishing as the runner-up with a time of 16:56.63.  For Donahue, today's performance marked the third runner-up finish of her career, and her 11th top-10 finish in 13 career races.

The Wildcats also got top-10 showings today from sophomore Amy Trabert (Amherst, N.Y./Amherst) and junior Brittany Denton (Oakfield, N.Y./Oakfield-Alabama).  Trabert (17:03.67) finished in fourth place while Denton (18:14.84) came in seventh.

Rounding out the Wildcats' scorers today was junior Morgan Urbanek (Webster, N.Y./Webster Schroeder).  Urbaned finished in 14th place with a time of 18:55.66.

Daemen totaled just 28 points in the meet, comfortably placing ahead of second-place Le Moyne College, the race host.

The race today also marked the head coaching debut of Daemen's Paul Lagno.  Lagno took the reins of the program earlier this summer from Jessica Gorski who stepped down to fulfill additional administrative responsibilities as the Associate Athletics Director for Internal Relations.

Lagno's squad will return to racing on September 19 at the Rochester Yellowjacket Invitational.

For continuing coverage on the Daemen women's cross country team throughout the season, follow@DaemenAthletics and @DaemenXC on Twitter.