2014 PacWest Cross Country Championship Results (men)2014 PacWest Cross Country Championship Results (women)
Fresno, CA – In Friday's Pacific West Conference Championship races, ART U Cross Country delivered a pair of Top 4 finishes from each gender, giving nine Urban Knights the opportunity to compete at NCAA Division II Regionals. The second-place men's squad was led by the tandem of junior Valentin Pepiot (third) and freshman Mack Marbas (fourth) while the women took fourth paced by redshirt freshman McKaela Christenson (sixth) and sophomore Kaelyn Harbison (eighth).
Enabling Academy of Art to its best finish since 2011, Pepiot and Marbas worked together against a California Baptist-heavy front pack to each finish in the top four of the men's 8k course out around Woodward Park. Pepiot went 25:07.64 and Marbas followed up with a 25:10.36 to serve as the second-highest freshman in the results. Both would be named to the All-PacWest First Team which was awarded to the top seven finishers.
Sophomore
Austin Esposito also broke into the Top 10 for All-PacWest Second Team honors with a 25:37.97 that put him ninth overall. The mark was his second-lowest to date behind his personal record (25:35.2) which came most recently at the Bronco Invitational. Fellow sophomore
Logan Means had the best race of his ART U career with a 26:29.27 good for 25th overall.
"In my three years here, the PacWest Conference has gotten immeasurably better," head coach
Torrey Olson said. "The atmosphere of the meet has changed with the level of competition and the emotion throughout the course was palpable. However, both of our teams' performances represent the best in my time here and I'm very proud of these artist-athletes for working so hard to be their best. In particular, it was thrilling to see Mack and Austin rise to the level I knew they were capable of when the team needed them. It took dedication, and I hope their effort becomes a model for our future Knights."
At 30th and 31st respectively, freshmen
Brett Bermudez and
Chris Costa ended 11 seconds apart with Bermudez going 26:40.61 and Costa turning in a time of 26:51.18.
Collectively as a team, the Knights (2:09:05.85) were under three seconds from the top finishing California Baptist (2:06:38.53) and less than a second ahead of third-place Azusa Pacific (2:09:51.52). CBU's Taylor Guske was the individual champion, finishing 24:49.98.
Christenson and Harbison stayed with the front group for much of the 6k race to wind up sixth and eighth respectively. Christenson was the highest freshman to finish at 22:04.72 while Harbison finished strong at 22:11.84. Besting top runners from Fresno Pacific, BYU-Hawaii, and Point Loma, both earn All-PacWest Team honors for their efforts with Christenson on the First Team and Harbison on the Second Team.
In the second pairing, junior
Elizabeth Khuu and redshirt freshman
Ericka Taylor went 23:07.42 and 23:20.62 respectively to each claim All-PacWest Third Team awards. Khuu was 18th overall and Taylor finished 21st.
A final ART U duo, freshman
Jamie Morris and sophomore
Emily McCarty, crossed the finish line separated by 15 seconds. Morris took 30th overall (24:00.61) and McCarty was 32nd (24:15.36).
The women improved on their eighth place finish the past two seasons with fourth overall on Friday, coming in at 1:54:45.21 as a group. The collective time was a little over two seconds behind third-place Hawaii Pacific (1:52:26.03) and four-plus seconds ahead of fifth-place Fresno Pacific (1:59:08.39). Although HPU's Fionna McKenna was the individual champion (21:11.23), California Baptist took the team title with all five qualifiers in the Top 22.
Academy of Art will now send its men's team along with four individuals from the women's squad to NCAA West Regionals set to take place in Billings, MT on Nov. 22.
