In cross country, running as a pack near the front of the competition is an asset that most teams strive for. The Northwestern girls' cross country team is one of the top teams that does that to a tee.

That cohesion was evident once again during last week's Colonial League Cross Country Championship Meet at DeSales University. And the result their togetherness produced was a sea of black and gold after the first 10 finishers.

Carly Pierce led the Lady Tigers with a sixth-place finish, and Molly Tarvin came in ninth, but it was the pack of Tigers just outside the top 10 that sealed a fourth-consecutive league title. Rachele Cerrone came in 11th place to lead a group of seven straight Lady Tigers to cross the finish line before any other school.

"I feel if we can stay as a pack like that, there isn't too much that other teams will be able to do to break us up," Pierce said. "They've been pretty close the past few races. I never really know what is going to happen with them, but it's good to know that they can stick together like that."

The Lady Tigers' rounded out their top five with Hannah Herzon (12th) and Abigail Supplee (13th). They were followed by teammates Abigail Smith (14th), Rachel Mikols (15th), Angela Alden (16th) and Paige Stitzel (16th).

The Lady Tiger pack stayed close to the front the whole way.

"There were three or four Northwestern girls that started off right behind the front pack," Pierce said. "I thought that was a good place to stay, just so we wouldn't die toward the beginning, and we could pick them off toward the middle and end of race."

For Pierce, she had her eyes set on a top-five finish after placing third in last year's league meet. She may have finished one spot off that, and a little more than 23 seconds off last year's mark, but leading the Tigers to another conference trophy was the top priority.

"It feels very good," Pierce said of the team's finish. "It feels very complete.

"I wish I would have been in the top five, but I'm not too upset about it. As long as I got in the top 10 I was pretty content with it."

Coming off back-to-back district titles, nothing has changed in terms of expectations from the past two years.

"That's definitely our goal, so we can secure our place going into states," Pierce said.

Southern Lehigh's Meseret Hart finished first in the girls' race with a time of 19:50.56, the only sub 20-minute finish on the day.

Braden Heller put together the best performance of any Tiger, finishing in fifth place with a time of 17:33.44. His finish was over 35 seconds better than last year, and he took a big jump from last year's 14th-place finish.

"I was going for third," Keller said. "I told myself before the race that I was going to be happy if I got fifth, but no worse than fifth. So I'm good.

"I tried to stick with [Bangor's] Brandon Tocket, but I had a little side-sticker the last half mile. I did all I could."

Heller had his eyes set on Tocket for much of the race, looking to run stride for stride with the Bangor runner. He did that for the course's first two miles or so, but as the cornfields approached in the final stretch, Heller lost him a bit.

"I knew that during the race Gonoude and Espinal were going to go, and I was just going to try and stay with Tocket and the rest of the guys. Tocket actually went out with them for a little bit, so I stayed with them. When we went into the woods for the last mile, and I dropped back."

Heller actually fell to seventh place about 2.2 miles into the race. But a strong finish in the homestretch, including a sprint with the finish line in sight, earned him a top-five spot.

"It was going up the first hill and going up the first turn," Heller said. "Ever since then I just sort of made up some ground.

"I sprinted at the last straight to make fifth. I passed Gavin Kemery from Northern Lehigh in the last stretch. I tried to catch [Moravian's] Sam Li and almost got him, but it was a little too late."

Philip Castrine (22), Alec Consuelos (31), Kavan Fitzpatrick (36) and Joshua Kromer (38) rounded out the Tigers' top-five finishers. The boys placed sixth as a team.

Salisbury's Kyle Gonoude repeated as the Colonial League boys' individual champion with a time of 16:51.44. Saucon Valley edged out Bangor for the team title by two points.