BETHLEHEM, Pa. - Lafayette returned to action Friday afternoon at the 42nd-annual Paul Short Run, a large-scale event which had over 400 collegiate and high school teams and over 5,500 athletes competing throughout the day.

The Leopard men, running in the College Brown 8K Race, placed 23rd out of 39 teams, finishing higher in the standings than Bucknell, last year's Patriot League runner-up, and Loyola. The women, meanwhile, ran to a 34th-place finish in the College Gold 6K Race.

"I'm proud of how both our men and women ran today," distance coach Jen Buirkle said. "I thought the women did a really good job of working together through most of the race, and we had a few athletes step up in the group. On the men's side, Kelvin is gaining more confidence with each race he runs, and that showed today. Andrew and Tom also did a great job pushing each other during the second half of the race."

Kelvin Serem was the first Lafayette male to cross the finish line. He completed the course in 25:41, a time good enough for 64rd place out of 354 runners. Andrew Morra also cracked the top 100, placing 98th with a time of 25:55, while Thomas Day was only a second behind at 25:56 to finish 101st. Morra registered his highest result among Leopard runners so far this season.

Matthew Weintraub (26:38 - 178th) and David Sadvary (26:43 - 183rd) completed the team scoring for the Maroon and White. Lafayette's team score of 625 points was 23 ahead of Bucknell, which finished 24th overall. Shippensburg (57 points), which had three runners post top-five times, took first place in the race.

Stephanie Benko (22:59 - 194th) had the top result for the Leopard women in the Gold 6K Race, the highest-level collegiate women's race held at the meet. Lafayette's five scorers crossed the line within 31 seconds of each other. Alexa Kwapinski (23:13 - 208th) was next after Benko, with Caroline Harmon (23:16 - 213th), Mikayla Pacilio (23:21 - 216th) and Emily Moore (23:30 - 219th) close behind.

The University of Guelph, a Canadian school based in Ontario, topped the field with a final total of 105 points, 50 fewer than second-place Cornell. Navy was the top Patriot League finisher in ninth place.

The Leopards are down to one more regular season meet prior to this year's conference championship on Oct. 31. That meet will take place out at the Metzgar Fields Athletic Complex, as the men's and women's squads will host the Leopard Invitational at 10 a.m. on Oct. 17.