By Ajan Caneda

Contributing Writer

The men’s cross country season started on a positive note at the Bison Open last Saturday against runners from Bloomsburg, Susquehanna and Juniata. Sixty-five runners competed at the humid West Fields and captain David Brown ’12 finished first overall with a time of 14:51. Fellow captain Dan Dillon ’12  finished second in the meet with a time of 14:54.

“Today was a pretty good day for our team, but we definitely have a lot of room for improvement,” said Dillon. “We’re shooting for a top-three finish at Leagues this year, and we have some good competition in the Patriot League.”

Thirteen Bison men finished in the top 20 and D.J. Krystek ’13, John Dugan ’15 and Eric Balaban ’14 all cracked the top 10 with finishes of third, sixth and seventh, respectively.

“Our front racers had good races and I think we are on our way to a successful season as long as we are able to stay healthy and train as hard as we have been,” said Brian Charland ’13.

This season, the Bison men expect to improve on a sixth-place finish from last season in the Patriot League Championships. With a healthy squad of returning runners and a group of new first-years, coach Kevin Donner will have an opportunity to do just this.

“We’ve been training hard all summer and want to continue the momentum into the rest of the season,” said Dugan.

The first-years will  need to step up this season, but they definitely got off to a good start on Saturday. Andrew Kirna ’15 and Michael McGowan ’15 each had top-10 finishes and will certainly use this race as a launching point for the rest of the season.

The Bison men travel to Pittsburgh to take on Duquesne for their next meet on Sept. 17.