COLUMBIA, Mo. – Kansas Wesleyan men’s cross country posted a 12th place finish at the Larry Young Invitational hosted by Columbia College on Saturday.

The field of 17 teams featured a variety of squads from the NCAA Division II and III levels and the NAIA level.

Austin Hess (SO/Garden City, Kan.) was the top finisher for the young Coyote squad, finishing 59th with a time of 29:02.47 for the 8K course. Giovanni Rios (FR/Temecula, Calif.) finished 66th for the Coyotes in 29:19.87, Gavin Tucker (FR/Wichita, Kan.) was 68th in 29:20.56, Cisco Alvarez (FR/Colorado Springs, Colo.) was 79th in 29:53.47, and Steven Merrill (SO/Arvada, Colo.) was 92nd to round out Wesleyan’s top 5 finishers in the meet.

Jack Horacek (FR/Topeka, Kan.) was 99th in 31:03.49, Trey Stramel (SO/Colby, Kan.) was 102nd in 31:17.30 and Timothy Kilburn (SO/Camp Humphreys, South Korea) was 136th in 35:37.00 to round out the Coyote finishers.

The Coyotes scored 285 points in the meet finished well ahead of Webster (Mo.) in the standings, who had 301. MidAmerica Nazarene was in 11th ahead of the Coyotes with 242 points.

Missouri S&T was the team champion with 72 points, 30 ahead of second place Lindenwood.

Emad Bashir-Mohammed from Friends was the individual champion, with an 18 second win over Louis Moreau from Lindenwood. Bashir-Mohammed ran a 25:34.73 in the race.

Up next for the Coyotes will be the Fort Hays State Tiger Open on October 9 at Sand Plum Nature Trail in Victoria, Kan.