HOUGHTON, N.Y. -- For the second straight meet, Daemen University junior Jon Moote (Wilson, N.Y.) finished first overall as he helped the Wildcat men's cross country team to a third place finish at the Highlander Invitational hosted by Houghton. 

Moote paced the field of 123 runners for a personal-best and program record first-place time of 25:30.1 over the 8K race. The junior was the only Wildcat runner to finish in the top-10 today. 

Daemen placed third out of 10 teams, marking the highest team finish at the Highlander Invitational in program history. The previous team-high finish for the Daemen men was 5th out of six teams in 2005. RIT posted a team-title winning score of 35 after placing the fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth place runners in the race. St. John Fisher (47) finished second overall after placing three runners in the top-10. Daemen finished third overall with 80 points. Cortland (120) placed fourth, Houghton (139) finished fifth, and Brockport (158), Alfred State (200), Alfred (244), Finger Lakes CC (264) and Keuka (310) rounded out the rest of the field.

All 12 Daemen runners set personal records in today's race. 

The Wildcats return to Buffalo next weekend on Saturday, October 15 when they race in the Canisius Alumni Classic at Buffalo's Delaware Park. 

FULL RESULTS

HIGHLIGHTS

• Moote's time of 25:30.1 sets a Daemen 8K record, two seconds faster from Kevin Roginson's program record of 25:32.6 set at the 2016 Harry F. Anderson Invitational.  
• For the second straight meet, Moote finished first overall, and for the second straight meet, he recorded a personal best time. Moote shaved over a minute off his previous PR time (26:41.6) that he just set at the Equality Invitational on September 25. 
• 12 Daemen runners participated in the race today.
• Junior Connor O'Brien (Hamburg, N.Y.) finished 11th overall, posting a personal-best time of 26:42.3. He shaved 30 seconds off his previous PR (27:13.2) set at the 2021 East Coast Conference championship.
• Junior Phil Ceccarelli (Hamburg, N.Y.) finished 21st with a personal record time of 27:04.3, one minute and 16 seconds faster than his previous PR (28:20.1) set at the Equality Invitational.
• Senior Dominic Clementi (Barker, N.Y.) finished just eight seconds behind Ceccarelli, posting a 23rd place time of 27:12.1 for a personal best, shaving 34 seconds off of his previous PR set at the 2021 ECC Championships (27:45.3).
• Junior Steven Blatto (Lancaster, N.Y.) rounded out the scoring for Daemen, crossing the finish line 25th overall with a PR time of 27:14.0, over a minute faster than his previous personal record (28:23.5) set at the 2021 ECC Championship. 
• Junior David Schwinger (Buffalo, N.Y.) posted a personal-best time 27:49.9 to finish 39th overall. 
• Freshman Aidan Kincaid (Orchard Park, N.Y.) shaved over a minute off his personal record at the Equality Invitational, posting a 27:51.9 to finish 41st.
• Sophomore John Balch (Saranac, N.Y.), senior John Bruggman (Batavia, N.Y.) and freshman Josh Trometer (Lancaster, N.Y.) all finished within nine seconds of one another. Balch placed 49th with a personal-record time of 28:16.4, Bruggman finished six seconds behind him for a 51st place finish and personal-best time of 28:22.6, and Trometer posted a personal-best time of 28:27.9 in his second ever career race. 
• Junior Laertes Cushing (Alfred, N.Y.) and redshirt-senior Alexander Reynolds (Olean, N.Y.) also figured into the race, with Cushing finishing 87th overall with a personal-record time of 30:03.2, 46 seconds faster than his previous PR at the Equality Invitational (30:50.2), and Reynolds rounding out the Daemen runners with a personal-best time of 30:18.9 to finish 88th.