ASU’s Lane claims first weekly SWAC cross country accolade
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (bamastatesports.com) – In her first event as a Lady Hornet, Janice Lane of the Alabama State women’s cross country team picks up the Southwestern Athletic Conference Runner of the Week honors as selected by the league office Thursday.
Lane is a junior transfer from Maryland Eastern Shore and a native of Corona, Calif., posting a time of 20:33.6 during the Tennessee Tech Golden Eagle Invitational, helping Alabama State go 2-1 in the unique head-to-head style competition against Western Kentucky, Purdue and Alabama A&M. Lane, who posted a mile split of 6:37.0 was the top finisher in ASU’s duel versus AAMU, and was fourth-fastest in the team’s win over Western Kentucky.
“We are definitely excited about Janice Lane joining us,” said head coach Ritchie Beene. “She comes to us from UMES as a transfer student and for her first event out for us she did very well. We had some challenges on the course, but she stepped up and that’s the type of upperclassman leadership that we are looking for although this is only her first year with our program. She’s a very bright student in the classroom and people who make good decisions in the classroom definitely make good decisions performing. I think that this is a great way to cap off her new experience here at Alabama State University.”
Lane and her teammates will travel to Mobile, AL to compete Friday in the Azalea City Classic hosted by the University of South Alabama.
“I expect the same thing and more from Lane over the weekend in Mobile,” said Beene. “I expect for her to get better and do what we recruited her to do. We are looking for her to lead by example and to lead by example in the classroom for someone else to step it up and improve and maybe we will have a different person next week as runner of the week. We are just going to keep working.”
