SAINT JOSEPH’S MEN’S CROSS COUNTRY TO OPEN 2013 SEASON THIS SATURDAY
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Courtesy of SJU Athletic Communications
Aug. 29, 2013
PHILADELPHIA – After taking home a third-place finish in 2011 and the silver medal in 2012, the 2013 Saint Joseph’s men’s cross country team, picked to finish second at the Atlantic 10 Championship on November 3, has its eyes on the A-10 title. Under the direction of head coach Mike Glavin, the squad returns 14 dedicated letterwinners and adds seven new faces to open up the 2013 season. The Hawks will look toward the experience of their 11 upperclassmen veterans, led by a trio of captains in Aaron Leskow, Mike Rankin, andSean Staltari.
Coming off of a personal-record breaking season in which he finished fourth at the Princeton Invitational and 11th at the IC4A Championship, Leskow returns as a tri-captain in his final season as a Hawk. The senior finished in SJU’s top five in all six of his meets last year en route to an eventual 29th-place scoring opportunity for SJU at the 2012 A-10 Championship.
A four-year member of the squad, one of the most memorable moments of the 2012 season included Rankin’s 23rd-place finish at the A-10 Championship. The senior tri-captain demonstrated both his ability to step up and his commitment to team success when he finished second on the squad on the Belmont Plateau, one of the most demanding courses of the season.
The Crimson and Gray’s third captain in 2013, Staltari has made solid strides on the cross country scene throughout his career on Hawk Hill. A leader through his dedication to the squad, Staltari was rewarded with SJU’s Raymond Vasquez award for loyalty last season
The dynamic duo of juniors Logan Mohn and Paul Szulewski return this season having led the Hawks in their final three meets of 2012. Mohn, an All-Conference selection and last year’s Most Outstanding Performer, lit up the course of the Belmont Plateau with a seventh-place finish at last year’s A-10 Championship and is just one of two returning 2012 top 10 finishers in the entire conference. Szulewski led SJU late in the season with a 30th-place finish at the Mid-Atlantic Regional and a ninth-place finish at the IC4A Championship.
The senior duo of Tommy O’Kane and Patrick Donnelly will round out SJU’s core of seasoned veterans. O’Kane scored for the Hawks at last season’s A-10s and is yet another senior that will make a definitive impact this season while Donnelly, who finished 24th at last season’s IC4A Championship, also adds qualitative depth to the Hawks.
Additional veterans in senior Max Margiotta and juniors Steven Butenewicz, Michael Cassidy, and Brady Deckert will round out the upperclassmen experience for Saint Joseph’s.
Sophomores Michael Coleman, Quinn Davis, and John Egan will round out the returners while freshmen Chris Bencivengo (Fairfield, Conn.), Michael Cassidy (Oaks, Pa.), James Daniels (Somerdale, N.J.), Jack Magee (North Wales, Pa.), John Mascioli (Wilmington, Del.), Daniel Savage (Glenolden, Pa), and Kevin Trimmer (Staten Island, N.Y.) will be a welcomed addition to the 2013 squad.
The Hawks will begin their regular season this Saturday, August 31 at the TCNJ Blue/Gold Classic in Pennington, N.J. Start time is scheduled for 9:00 a.m.
