Oct. 26, 1999

Tigers Eye Top-Three Finish

The Missouri cross country teams are headed into phase two of the season on Saturday, the championship season! On Saturday, October 30, MU will take on the rest of the conference at the Big XII Championships held in College Station, Texas at the Texas A&M Golf Course. The women take to the course at 10 a.m. to run their 5K race while the gun fires for the men's 10K race at 11 a.m. Both teams finished 3rd at the 1998 version of the conference championships.

Both teams are coming off sub-par performances at the Pre-Nationals meet last Saturday (Oct. 16), but are ready to go at conference.

"They are running the best they have all year," head coach Jeff Pigg said. "We have had a great week of practices. This is what we have been aiming at all season."

Men's Preview

On the men's side, this are much the same. Missouri has sacraficed a lot of early season success to be ready for the championship portion of the season. This has been especially evident in the last two invitationals the men have run in Indiana.

"We are healthy and sitting where we want to be," Pigg said. "We have turned in some great performances this year individually and the way we have trained heading into conference, I am excited to see what we can do."

Heading into the meet, Colorado is the heavy favorite, but after that it is wide open. Missouri is again looking for a top-three finish to prove that last season was not a fluke.

"We have five seniors on the squad that would love to close out their career with a bang," said Pigg. "They want to show they are for real."

This is a tremendour conference with no place to hide. It is deep, so deep that the men could have their best race of the season and finish anywhere from second to sixth.

There are four teams on the men's side that are either ranked or receiving votes in the Mondo poll. Colorado tops the men's teams matching the women's ranking of No. 4. Oklahoma State, Missouri and Texas are all receiving votes heading into the championships.