Baird’s Personal Best Helps UCI to Seventh

Freshman Courtney Baird’s personal-best time helped the UC Irvine women’s cross-country team finish seventh in the NCAA West Regional at Blue Lake Park in Troutdale, Ore., Saturday.

Baird finished 17th, covering the 5,000-meter course in 17 minutes 37 seconds. She shaved 29 seconds off her previous top time.

Her performance could earn her a spot in the NCAA championships, which will be held Nov. 22 in Bloomington, Ind.

The top two teams from each region qualify and 13 other teams nationally will receive at-large berths.

Four runners from each of the nine regions who are not on teams that qualify for the championships are invited.

Kareen Nilsson finished 37th with a time of 18:15.

In the men’s competition, John Doroski and Mike Murray led Irvine to a ninth-place finish.

Doroski was 25th in the 10,000-meter race with a time of 31:38. Murray was 29th with a time of 31:46.

In nonconference women’s basketball:

Concordia 66, Westminster College 51--Jaime Gast, Priscilla Bendik and Taryn Commins combined for 40 points for host Concordia (1-0). Gast led all scorers with 16 points and had six assists and four rebounds.

In Big West Conference women’s volleyball:

Cal Poly San Luis Obispo 3, UC Irvine 0--Larissa Carter had 16 kills and Brooke Witt had 15 for UC Irvine (8-20, 1-15). Kari DeSoto had 16 kills for Cal Poly (19-7, 11-5), which won, 16-14, 15-8, 15-13. Cal Poly had 20 blocks to four for the Anteaters.

Pacific 3, Long Beach State 1--Elsa Stegemann had 30 kills and Jennica Smith had 26 kills and 12 digs to lead visiting Pacific (25-2, 15-1), which won 15-4, 13-15, 15-11, 15-10 and captured the Western Division title.

Cheryl Weaver had 29 kills and Tayyiba Haneef had 27 for Long Beach (22-3, 14-2).

UC Santa Barbara 3, Cal State Fullerton 0--Roberta Gehlke had 18 kills and 15 digs to lead visiting Santa Barbara (22-5, 12-4), which won 15-4, 15-10, 15-4.

Cal State Fullerton (7-22, 3-13) was led by Jamie Ivers with 11 kills.