Finishing with 246 team points at the Southern California Championships at Chaffey College on Friday, the Cerritos College women's cross country team finished in eighth place out of 21 schools. The Falcons have qualified for the 3C2A State Championships, which will take place at Woodward Park in Fresno on November 23.

Of the top 10 scoring schools, Cerritos had the lowest top finisher, but were able to bunch their runners, which helped them move up in the team standings.

Completing the 5K course first for the Falcons was Diana Raya Perez (Norwalk HS), whose time of 20:50.7 put her in 28th place out of 143 runners on the day. She was able to hold off four runners who all finished within four seconds of her time. The next runner for Cerritos to cross the finish line was Jayla Barnwell (Warren HS), who posted a 50th place time of 21:31.7 and was edged out by two other runners who finished less than a second ahead of her. The same happened the Evelyn Mejia (Norwalk HS), who turned in a 57th place time of 21:43.7 and was beat out by less than a second from finishing a place higher.

The other two runners who helped comprise the team score crossed the finish line 13 seconds apart. Lila Palmer (Long Beach Poly HS) turned in a 66th place time of 21:55.5, with Claudia Rios (Paramount HS) finishing 71st on the day in a time of 22:08.2. Also running for the Falcons were Kaitlyn Macias (La Mirada HS), who finished 111th in a time of 24:20.7, while Ariel Alvarez (Firebaugh HS) was unable to finish the race.