Buffs Finish Fourth At Montana State Invitational

BOZEMAN, Mont.–The Colorado Buffaloes Ski Team slipped to fourth place after the slalom races Wednesday here at Bridger Bowl to close out the Montana State Invitational.

The Buffs had a few unfortunate circumstances that likely kept them from finishing in second place. Utah ran away with the meet, scoring 760 points while Montana State (506.5), Denver (504) and Colorado (502) were all within 4.5 points in second through fourth places. The Buffs top two seeded skiers on the men's side both didn't finish and the CU women just finished two, missing a third scorer.

The men started the day in the season's first slalom race, and in the end the Buffs were led by Joey Young, who finished 11th in his 51st career race for the Buffs. Max Bervy finished 13th and Jacob Dilling 15th in the scoring positions. Filip Forejtek, who won Tuesday's GS and has finished 16 of his last 18 career races, didn't finish the first run. Louis Fausa was disqualified on the final gate of his second run. He was originally given eighth place prior to being disqualified.

The women followed suit and the Buffs had just four skiers racing and just two ended up finishing the race. Emma Hammergaard had the best finish of the day for the Buffs, taking eighth, and Katie Fleckenstein finished her first career race, taking 18th. Cleo Braun and Elena Exenberger both did not finish the race.

WHAT IT MEANS: The Buffs are never OK with finishing fourth in a meet, but building a championship team doesn't always result in regular season meet wins. Utah looks exceptionally strong, but the Buffs left plenty of points on the courses and finished just 4.5 points out of second place. Within any race in a meet, there are easy ways to envision picking up five points. Moving forward,

UP NEXT: The Buffs have completed the first meet of the season and will not have an extra slalom race here at Bridger Bowl Thursday that will be part of the RMISA Invitational, which is a grouping of races from different venues to calculate team scoring for an extra meet.

TEAM NOTES:

The Buffs finished fourth, but were just 4.5 points out of second place at the end of eight races over the past five days. CU scored 57 points in the men's race and 43 in the women's race for a total of 100 on the final day of the meet to finish with 502 points.
The men's team scored 57 points, 21 from Young, 19 from Bervy and 17 from Dilling.
The women's team had just two scorers with Hammergaard scoring 25 and Fleckenstein 18 for a total of 43.

WOMEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:

Emma Hammergaard finished eighth, her fourth slalom top 10 finish in 10 finished career races and first top 10 of the season.
Katie Fleckenstein finished 18th in her first career finish after picking up a DNF on Tuesday.
Cleo Braun and Elena Exenberger both didn't finish the second run.

MEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:

Joey Young finished 11th in his 51st career race. He's now five races away from representing the Buffs in more races than any other skier since 1989.
Max Bervy finished 13th in his 36th career race. He's finished 27 of those 36 races and this is his 14th top 20 performance.
Jacob Dilling finish 15th in his second career race, and his first slalom contest.
Alex Birkner finished 26th in his 24th career race, finishing 21 of those 24 races.
Filip Forejtek, Bobby Ryan and Chase Seymour didn't finish the first run and Louis Fausa was disqualified from the second run.

MONTANA STATE INVITATIONAL TEAM STANDINGS (FINAL): 1. Utah 760; 2. Montana State 506.5; 3. Denver 504; 4. Colorado 502; 5. Alaska Anchorage 406; 6. Westminster 308; 7. Alaska Fairbanks 281; 8. Colorado Mountain 162.5; 9. Wyoming 101.

MEN'S SLALOM (32 collegiate finishers)—1. Bjorn Brudevoll, UU, 1:45.37; 2. Wilhelm Normannseth, UU, 1:45.68; 3. Mikkel Solbakken, WMC, 1:45.76; 4. Francesco Gori, WMC, 1:46.16; 5. Jeremy Mathers, UU, 1:46.41; 6. Henry Heaydon, MSU, 1:46.92; 7. Leon Nikic, UAA, 1:46.94; 8. Oliver Parazette, UU, 1:47.22; 9. Dawson Yates, MSU, 1:47.61; 10. Tobias Kogler, DU, 1:47.79. CU Finishers: 11. Joey Young, 1:47.83; 13. Max Bervy, 1:47.99; 15. Jacob Dilling, 1:48.13; 26. Alex Birkner, 1:52.84. Did Not Finish First Run: Filip Forejtek, Chase Seymour, Bobby Ryan. Disqualified Second Run: Louis Fausa.

WOMEN'S SLALOM (24 collegiate finishers)—1. Katie Parker, UU, 1:52.59; 2. Kristiane Bekkestad, MSU, 1:52.89; 3. Eleri Smart, DU, 1:53.05; 4. Denise Dingsleder, WMC, 1:53.17; 5. Sona Moravcikova, UU, 1:53.19; 6. Josephine Selvaag, UU, 1:53.32; 7. Kaja Norbye, UU, 1:53.86; 8. Emma Hammergaard, 1:53.95; 9. Julie Toiviainen, WMC, 1:54.12; 10. Ylva Falksete, MSU, 1:54.16. Other CU Finishers: 18. Katie Fleckenstein, 2:00.01. Did Not FInish Second Run: Cleo Braun, Elene Exenberger.

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Players Mentioned

Max Bervy

Alex Birkner

Cleo Braun

Jacob Dilling

Elena Exenberger

Louis Fausa

Katie Fleckenstein

Filip Forejtek

Emma Hammergaard

Bobby Ryan

Chase Seymour

Joey Young