Monday, November 19, 2018
INDIANAPOLIS – What has been an outstanding season for the GNAC is only getting better as a total of seven conference teams and four individuals have earned invitations to the NCAA Division II Cross Country Championships, which will be held on Sat., Dec. 1, at the Bob O’Conner Golf Course in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Both the men’s and women’s teams from Alaska Anchorage and Simon Fraser earned automatic invitations to the meet thanks to top-three finishes at Saturday’s NCAA West Regional Championships. The two will be joined by the men’s and women’s teams from Western Washington and the women’s team from Seattle Pacific, which received at-large invitations.
In addition, Central Washington sophomore Nicole Soleim and senior Alexa Shindruk received individual invitations to the women’s race while Western Oregon seniors Tyler Jones and Dustin Nading earned men’s race invitations.
The selections speak to not only the strength of the GNAC, but to the entire West Region in Division II cross country. A total of 10 teams from the region will be competing at the national meet, five in each gender, with seven of those squads coming from the GNAC. It the most teams to represent the conference at the national meet since seven teams were invited to compete in 2014. With the individual invitations, six of the conference’s 11 schools will be represented in Pittsburgh.
On the women’s side, Alaska Anchorage and Simon Fraser earned automatic invitations to the national meet by placing first and second, respectively. The Seawolves won their third West Regional championship with 66 points and the Clan placed second with 85 points. Seattle Pacific earned an at-large invitation after finishing fourth with 182 points. Western Washington also earned an at-large berth after placing fifth with 187 points.
Simon Fraser’s men earned an automatic bid to Pittsburgh with a second-place finish at the regional meet with a score of 63 points. Alaska Anchorage earned the third and final automatic berth with a third-place finish at 116 points. The Vikings, meanwhile, placed fifth with 189 points and received an at-large invitation.
Alaska Anchorage, Simon Fraser and Western Washington are three of 18 schools to have both its men’s and women’s teams invited to the national meet.
Soleim earned one of the West Region’s two women’s automatic individual berths with a fifth-place finish on Saturday in a time of 21:19.03. Shindruk, meanwhile, received one of two individual at-large berths awarded to the region after placing eighth in a time of 21:27.52.
Jones earned one of the region’s automatic individual berths for the men, placing ninth in a time of 31:12.85 over 10,000 meters. Nading received the only at-large men’s individual berth awarded to the region after he placed 10th in a time of 31:14.94.
The conference saw five of its teams finish in the top-10 in the women’s race at the NCAA West Regional Championships, which was hosted by Montana State Billings in Billings, Montana. Eight of the top-10 individuals were GNAC athletes, led by individual champion Emmah Chelimo of Alaska Anchorage, who clocked a time of 20:57.47.
Likewise, the conference placed five of its teams in the top-10 of the men’s race. Alaska Anchorage’s Felix Kemboi led six GNAC athletes to finish in the top-10 individually, placing second in a time of 30:50.84.
The Alaska Anchorage women will be competing at nationals for the 11th straight year. The Seawolves placed fifth last year with a score of 180 points behind individual national champion Caroline Kurgat. The Seawolves’ men return to nationals after a one-year absence and are in the meet for the 14th time in the program’s GNAC history.
The Simon Fraser women will compete at nationals for the third consecutive year while the men will race for the first time since 2015. Western Washington’s men and women earned their first invitations since 2014 while the Seattle Pacific women will compete for the first time since 2015.