MADISON, Wis. – Thanks to the one-two punch of sophomores Alicia Monson and Amy Davis, the No. 15 Wisconsin women's cross country team won the Mayflower Day Open on Saturday at the Thomas Zimmer Championship Course.
 
Monson and Davis finished only one-tenth of a second apart with times of 21 minutes 34.7 seconds and 21 minutes 34.8 seconds, respectively, in the 6K race. It marks the second time that Monson has led UW at a meet after the Amery, Wisconsin, native was UW's top finisher at the 2016 NCAA Great Lakes Regional. Davis, a Madison native, also picked up her second top-two finish of the year after winning the Indiana Open earlier this month.
 
"They are both really good athletes," UW Director of Track and Field and Cross Country Mick Byrne said. "They put on the uniform and did their work out here, and you saw that. They both followed our race plan and brought some of their teammates along in the process.
 
Monson and Davis led the way for six other Badgers to place in the top 15. Coming in fourth was sophomore Alissa Niggemann with a time of 21:59.2, while Erin Wagner followed right behind coming in fifth place with a 22:12.2 finish. Junior Rachel Fleddermann was seventh in 22:25.3, while freshman Megan Olshanski ran unattached and finished ninth.
 
Wisconsin won its dual with UNI thanks to a score of 19 points compared to UNI's 36 points, while UW tallied a perfect score of 15 points against Illinois Chicago.
 
"This is what our sport is about," Byrne said. "It's head-to-head competition and at the end of the day you have a winner. You saw the women over the last two kilometers take control and that's what we wanted."
 
After a week off of competition, UW is back in action on Sept. 30 at the Greater Louisville Classic in Louisville, Kentucky, the site of the 2017 NCAA Cross Country Championships. Following the Greater Louisville Classic, UW will return home for the 2017 Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational presented by Under Armour on Oct. 13 at the Zimmer Championship Course.