Aggies take 5th, Korir to Nationals

ABILENE, Texas (November 7) – It was a historic day for the regionally-ranked #10 Cameron Aggie cross country team today at the NCAA South Central Regional Championships. CU took home 5th place in arguably the toughest region in the nation. What made the afternoon even more exciting was that sophomore runner Julius Korir placed 4th overall, and thus will represent the Black and Gold at the NCAA National Championships.

“I’m really impressed with our 5th place finish,” Head Coach Matt Aguero said. “Last year we finished in 15th so we made a huge improvement this year; the guys are really happy. We did well and overall it was an unbelievable day. We were tied at #10 in the region going in to today and we came out #5.”

Korir continued his streak of perfection as Cameron’s top finisher in every event this fall. His 4th place finish in today’s 10-kilometer race was timed at 31:20.16, which gives him a mile average of 5:02.6. Korir’s finish sets the Cameron University school record for highest finish at the NCAA Regional Championships.

“Julius took 4th place with an awesome race,” Coach Aguero said. “He qualified for nationals and gave us our best regional finish in school history.”

With a total team score of 224, CU finished ahead of a number of regionally-ranked teams and five spots ahead of this year’s Lone Star Conference Champions, Abilene Christian University.

Missouri Southern won the Regional Championship with a total team score of 56, and will now head to the NCAA National Championship as a team with the other top finishers, Southwest Baptist (81) and Pittsburg State (86).

The top three teams and the top three individual runners not on the top three teams advance from Regionals to Nationals.

Amos Sang of the ACU Wildcats won the individual title with a time of 29:53.23. His average mile time was a blistering 4:48.6.

Senior Josh Stewart barely missed out on making the All-Region team with an 18th place finish and a time of 32:19.63. His average mile time this afternoon was 5:12.2.

“Josh almost qualified the All-Region team,” Coach Aguero said. “He did really well for his final collegiate race.”

Once again rounding out CU’s top three runners was junior Mohamed Khelalfa who finished in 38th place. He averaged 5:20.9 per mile for a total time of 33:13.86.

“Mohamed did well but I was hoping that he might have a shot at a top 20 finish,” Coach Aguero said. “I knew our top 3 would run well because they have consistently all year.”

Senior Casey Kreger and junior Juan Ruiz rounded out Cameron’s top five finishes with times of 34:22.77 and 35:16.07, respectively. Kreger averaged 5:32.0 per mile while Ruiz averaged a 5:40.6.

“Casey ran a great race, especially for his last race as a senior,” Coach Aguero said. “He stepped up and beat a lot of guys that beat him at the LSC meet. Both Casey and Juan ran their best races today.”

Sophomore David Barmasai took home a 101st place finish with a time of 35:37.34 and senior Guy Narcomey followed right behind in 126th place with a time of 40:17.20. Barmasai and Narcomey ran average mile times of 5:44.0 and 6:29.0, respectively.

Korir will now prepare for the NCAA National Championships which take place in two weeks on Saturday, November 21, in Evansville, Indiana. The top 40 runners to finish the race make the All-America team.

The rest of CU’s cross country team will begin offseason training and preparation for the spring exhibition track season.