It took a tie-breaker, but the MHC Rattlers women’s cross country running team edged the St, Mary’s Lightning on Saturday to win the 2022 ACAC Cross Country Running Championships in Edmonton.

The MHC and St Mary’s women have battled all season. St Mary’s beat the Rattlers by two points on Oct.1 in Edmonton and prevailed by a single point at their home meet on Oct.15. On Saturday, both teams tied at 47 points, but the Rattlers claimed the victory based on a better position by their team’s final scoring runner.

The women’s cross country title was MHC’s second all time; the last win came 41 years ago in 1981.

Individually, Becky Ross led the team with a 4th place finish. Ross clocked a time 24:13 over the rolling 6 km course. Maddy Scrimger was close behind Ross, finishing in 6th place. Cheldynn Molnar (16th), Pyper Gill (21st) and Annika Marshall (41st) also chipped in for the MHC win.

Reigning CCAA champ Makenna Fitzgerald from SAIT Poly easily defended her 2021 ACAC individual crown, winning the women’s race in 22:51.

The Rattlers men also took part in the ACAC Championships finishing in 5th place, one place better than their 2021 finish. Six of the seven Rattler men ran their best race of the season. Second-year runner Brannon Sumner led the MHC men in 14th place, posting a time of 30:33 for the 8 km distance. Other MHC finishers included Jaiden Romanuik (16th), Carson Schiller (26th) Harrison Lawson (27th), Justin Jager (30th), Gage Smith (31st), and Shintaro Iwata (40th).

Placing 4 runners in the top 8, SAIT Poly handily won the ACAC men’s XC championship over second place Red Deer Poly. Leonard Cheeso from Concordia University of Edmonton won his third-straight individual men’s ACAC cross country title.

Also on Saturday, the ACAC handed out its season-end awards. Ross captured three honours: Rookie of the Year, Runner Up in the ACAC Grand Prix, and All Conference. Scrimger was also named All Conference and place third in the ACAC Grand Prix. Rattler’s coach Bill Corcoran was awarded ACAC Coach of the Year.

Next up for the Rattlers cross country team is the CCAA National Championships on their home course on the MHC campus on Saturday, November 12. Two hundred runners from approximately 30 schools across Canada are expected to be in the Hat to contest that race.

Full race results will be posted on the ACAC Cross Country Running site.