College of the Canyons men’s cross country competed at the annual Mt. San Antonio College Invitational on Friday, Oct. 18, running to a ninth-place finish in its final tune-up before the upcoming conference championship meet.

For the third time in as many meets it was COC sophomore Nathaniel Wilkinson leading the Cougars on the four-mile course. Wilkinson clocked a time of 22:25 to place 22nd in the field of 150.

COC freshman Musa Rahman was next for the Cougars at a pace of 22:53.1, good for 37th overall. Nathan Parras ran the course in a time of 23:10.2 to end the day in 46th place.

Montell Frye (25:56.0/99th) and Raul Rosas (31:27/0/137th) rounded out the cougar contingent on a day in which the Canyons team did not enter its regular seven-man squad.

Host Mt. SAC (25) won the meet followed by Hartnell College (64) and El Camino College (98) across the top three spots.

Canyons finished third among the four Western State Conference (WSC) programs that competed with Glendale (4th/140), Santa Monica (7th/206), COC and Oxnard (10th/248) included in that category.

COC’s women’s team did not compete in the event.

The Cougars will next run at the WSC Championships being held Friday, Oct. 25 at 1:00 p.m. at Oxnard College, with an eye toward qualifying for the 3C2A Southern California Regional Championships on Nov. 8.

Stay up to date on all this season’s action at COCathletics.com and on social media at @COCathletics on X, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.