MC lands two podium finishes at its home Watson Classic
Mississippi Christian University (MC) hosted the Watson Cross Country Classic at Choctaw Trails in Clinton on October 16, 2026, and came away with two team podium finishes at its own meet. The Choctaw women placed second and the men third. The men’s scoring five also finished in a tight pack, something you rarely see in college cross country.
The biggest Watson in history
In its preview the day before, MC said more than 30 teams were entered in both the men’s and women’s races. According to the organizers, it was the biggest college Watson meet in program history. For the home team, a field that size is nice for the record books and not much else. The first kilometer is a crowded scramble on a narrow course, and with this many runners, any mistake in the scoring five costs more than usual.
Truth is, cross country isn’t an easy sport to watch from the sidelines. The course winds into the woods, and from any one spot you only see the runners for a few seconds each lap. So fans, parents and teammates at Choctaw Trails spend most of the race phone in hand, refreshing live results as each split comes in. The gaps between splits feel long, and people fill the time however they can, with texts, social media and, for some, the mobile version of an online casino. Slots are made for that kind of short break, and Wild Tokyo Casino runs right in a mobile browser, and a couple of spins fit easily into the five-minute wait by the course before the pack comes back out of the trees.
Women take second with a three-point cushion
The MC women scored 83 points and finished second. Ouachita Baptist won with 45 and was in a class of its own. But Union, out of Tennessee, ended up behind the hosts at 86, three points back. In team scoring, a gap like that probably comes down to one pass in the final few hundred meters.
Catherine Wallace led the Choctaws, finishing 4th in the 6K in 22:28.8. The rest came in as a group. Audrey Mayatte was 16th (23:23.3), Ava Wardlaw 18th (23:30.3) and Elena Palacios 23rd (23:38.4).
That’s four MC runners in the top 25 in a field of about 30 teams. Without that depth, the Choctaws probably don’t hold off Union. Wallace couldn’t have done it alone.
Men’s scoring five separated by 12.3 seconds
Union won the men’s race with 78 points. Ouachita Baptist was second and MC third with 94, six points out of second place.
But the number that stood out belongs to the Choctaw men’s scoring five. Hudson Copeland ran the 8K in 25:45.7 for 14th, and Gabriel McElwain was 19th in 25:51.6. Carson Smith (25:56.2), Baxter Friedman (25:57.3) and Matthew Singletary (25:58.0) came in right behind them. That’s a 1-5 split of 12.3 seconds.
In cross country, that’s about as close to textbook as it gets. A team’s score is the sum of its runners’ places, and a tight pack picks up points where a lone front-runner can’t (though a front-runner is exactly what MC was missing that day). Caleb Whipp (26:01.5) and Colin Brannon (26:04.7) also cracked the top 30, so seven MC runners finished within 19 seconds of each other. That gives the coaches options heading into the conference meet if someone in the scoring five gets sick or just has an off day.
Up next, Huntsville and the conference
For the Choctaws, the Watson Classic was a tune-up. Next is the final regular-season meet in Huntsville, then the Gulf South Conference championship, where titles are on the line.
The women will go in with Wallace, 4th in Clinton, and a group that finished 16th through 23rd. The men have a different job. Someone from that tight pack has to break away up front. In the team standings, six points basically means one or two runners each getting past a few more opponents.
