GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.--The Lawrence Tech men's cross country team on Saturday competed at the 15th annual NAIA Great Lakes Challenge, hosted by Aquinas College. The Blue Devils scored 510 points for 19th place in a competitive field that included 15 schools nationally-ranked in the top-25 or receiving votes in the latest NAIA coaches' poll. COMPLETE RESULTS: Maroon / White

Junior Conner Uppleger and sophomore Luke Droz, who is the reigning Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference Men's Runner of the Week, gave LTU a pair of top-50 finishers. Uppleger, who made his first appearance of the season coming back from injury, crossed the finish line on the 8-kilometer Riverside Park course in 25 minutes and 30.30 seconds for 30th place, while Droz was 48th with a 25:39.9 time, out of 243 runners. Uppleger was the top placer from the WHAC.

"Despite muddy conditions that were worse than last week at Muskegon, we ran extremely well," LTU head coach Eric Green said. "We beat a couple of ranked teams which should help us get ranked ourselves, which was the whole goal for us this season. We also had a couple of guys step up that helped us, including Chase Dietrich (26:58.40) and Evan Wheeler (27:25.70) who came in third and fifth in our team scoring."

In addition, LTU had a "B" team compete in the White Division as Noah Blandino paced the squad that wound up 27th. He was 123rd out of 195 runners with a personal-record time of 29:53.0.

Green added: "This gave the rest of our guys an opportunity to run as a team for the first time this season. It was a fun race to watch seeing them run and being cheered on by the top runners of the team who ran earlier (in the Maroon Division). They don't get an opportunity to see their teammates compete so it was a cool thing to witness."

Rocky Mountain's Jackson Wilson won the individual crown in 24:37.20, and Indiana Wesleyan claimed the team title with 40 points.

Lawrence Tech will be idle next weekend to train for the WHAC Championships on Nov. 3 in Grand Rapids.