MARQUETTE, Mich. — John Skemp is desperate for snow.

How desperate? The Saint Mary's University nordic ski coach hopped in a f=van with his three skiers and traveled 976 miles and through one time zone so that his teams could participate in a meet in Marquette, Mich.

"The conditions were great," said Skemp, whose teams both finished 10th at the NCAA-qualifying event. "Driving up I was beginning to wonder, because there just wasn't any snow, at least not enough to ski on. But once we got to (Marquette), the conditions were very good."

Ben Hanson (Hastings, Minn.) was the lone SMU skier in the men's competition. Hanson clocked a time of 43:01 in the 10-kilometer classic race on Saturday, then followed that up with a 1:07.07 time in the 20K freestyle race on Sunday.

On the women's side, Missy Mollick (Hastings, Minn.) — competing in her first races of the season — crossed the finish line in 21:21 in the 5K classic race and 40:57 in the 10K freestyle. Teammate Rachel Lundell (Golden Valley, Minn.) added times of 23:01 in the 5K and 46:40 in the 10K.

"Overall, I thought we raced fairly well," said Skemp. "It's tough to train and get ready for these meets when you don't have much snow. We can do some training, but the snow we've got (in Winona) is pretty marginal, so it makes it hard to get in a lot of really good training.

"But I think we are progressing," continued Skemp, whose teams are back on the road this weekend, traveling to Ironwood, Mich. for another NCAA qualifer. "We skied well last week and we skied well again this week. Hopefully we can just keep that progression going."