Going into the Joe Piane Notre Dame Cross-Country Invitational, the Mizzou team knew they would be running against a tough field.

At Friday’s meet, the women ran against four ranked teams, including the No. 1 New Mexico Lobos. On the men’s side, six teams were ranked.

The women’s race was highlighted by a strong run from sophomore Karissa Schweizer, who finished 18th out of 171 runners. Schweizer finished the 5K race in a time of 16:59.3.

“It was good,” she said. “It was a very competitive field but I got out strong and worked my way up, so I was happy about it.”

The women finished in 15th place out of the 21 teams. The top five runners for the Tigers were Schweizer, junior Teylor Adelsberger, freshman Kelli Jackson, junior Nicole Mello and sophomore Jamie Kempfer. The Tigers were still without junior Kaitlyn Fischer, one of the top two runners on the team.

On the men’s side, junior Dan Roe led the Tiger runners, who finished 16th out of 20 teams. Roe completed his 8K with a time of 24:43.3 and finished in 50th place out of 167 runners.

Sophomore Evan Schulte, junior Jordan Cook, sophomore Sheldon Keence and sophomore Marc Dubrick rounded out the top five for the Tiger men.

Schweizer felt that running against such strong competition will be beneficial to the team going forward.

“It was our first big race, and it was just a big step for us, and we didn’t do as well as we hoped to, but I think it will definitely build us for future races,” Schweizer said.

The Tigers are back in action on Friday, Oct. 16 at the Bradley ‘Pink’ Classic.