CLINTON, Miss.—In a sea of underclassmen running for the Northwestern State cross country teams at Friday's Watson Invitational, it was a senior who stole the spotlight for the school on the campus of Mississippi College.

Out of the 10 finishers for the Demons and Lady Demons, nine of them are freshmen or sophomores. But it was the lone upperclassman, senior Leah Thompson, who led the way for Northwestern State.

"This is the biggest race we will be at all year," head coach Payten Vidourek said. "I am happy with the performance as well. It is a competitive race and they all performed really well."

Thompson clocked a personal-best 25:27.36 to place 66^th out of 178 finishers in the 6k race, the first among the Northwestern State runners.

"It was great to see Leah PR by more than 20 seconds,". Vidourek said. "She has been riddled with injuries the past few seasons. Now that she's finally healthy, she has had such a good year and has been great leader, guiding such a young team."

Faith Bryant, a sophomore from Pineville, placed 99^th out of the finishers and second among the Lady Demons with a time of 2:23.19.

Coming in third for the Lady Demons is freshman Chesney Mathews, who clocked a 27:15.06 to finish 117^th.

Samantha Todaro (28:05.31), Kallie Evers (28:55.01) and Brea-Baca White (30:27.62) rounded out the Lady Demons, finishing 131^st, 137^th and 145^th, respectively.

As a team, the Lady Demons finished in 19^th place out of 23. Points are issued to each finisher and the top five finishers from each school count toward that to make up your team score.

On the men's side, all four of the runners for the Demons are freshmen.

The Demons were led by Owen Rue, who ran a 28:21.00 to place 128^th out of a whopping 221 runners in the 8k race.

Landon Loyd was the next Demon to finish, as he placed 135^th, clocking a 28:31.80 in his first 8k of the season to prepare himself for the conference meet.

Kaden Elliot is the next Demon, running a 28:50.20 to place 151^st, followed by Mason Bayne, who ran a 29:15.20 to place 166^th.

"The guys all competed well," Vidourek said. "They are all young athletes who all dominated their PRs and Landon ran well in his first 8k of the year."

Next up for the Northwestern State cross country teams is a trip to New Orleans for the Southland Conference Championships on Nov. 1.