THIBODAUX, La. – The Nicholls State University cross country teams will travel to College Station, Texas to compete in the 2024 Arturo Barrios Invitational on Friday, Oct. 18.
 
The men's 8k race will begin at 8:30 a.m. followed by the women's 6k race at 9:15 a.m. at the Watts Cross Country Course.
 
40 teams will complete alongside the Red & Gray at the meet on Friday, including Abilene Christian, Arizona State, Arkansas State, Baylor, Boise State, Central Arkansas, Charleston Southern, Colorado (women), Delaware (women), Eastern Michigan, Georgia Tech, Gonzaga, Houston, Houston Christian, Incarnate Word, Lamar, Louisiana, McNeese State, Mercer, Middle Tennessee State, New Mexico State, New Orleans, North Dakota, North Texas, Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, Rice, Sam Houston, SMU (women), Stephen F. Austin, Texas A&M-Texarkana, Tarleton State, TCU, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Texas State, Texas Tech, UT-Arlington, UTSA, and Youngstown State.
 
Nicholls head coach Stefanie Slekis spoke about the loaded field and how that can help the Colonels.
 
"The Arturo Barrios invitational is a fantastic opportunity for our teams to compete against both nationally and regionally ranked teams with 10 of the top 15 south central regional teams there," Slekis said. "Not only will we be able to see more teams from our region, but we will be able to run the course that will host the NCAA South Central Region championship in November."
 
Slekis gave her thoughts on the women's unit performances thus far.
 
"Our women's team has a strong top three with Maria Nikolaou, Issy Rivault, and Kassidy Besson improving substantially from our home meet a year ago. I'm looking forward to how close they can run to other SLC team's top runners," Slekis said. "We also have a big group that can fill our fourth and fifth spots who have been working to close the gap to that third runner."
 
Slekis also spoke about the men's squad improvement over the past few weeks.
 
"On the men's side Lucas Futey has strung together his best training block ever since his time at Nicholls and is ready to lead the men's team to a strong finish," Slekis said.  "William Nizzo and Brady Sins have shown improvement to close that time gap between Luke as well as our next group moving up to fill that fourth and fifth spots to close the team spread."