Senior
James Settles won the NCAA Division III West Region cross country individual title to automatically qualify for next weekend's NCAA Division III National Championship Meet and led Colorado College to a fourth-place team finish Saturday in Riverside, Calif.
Settles, who won the SCAC Championship Meet two weeks ago, is CC's first regional champion since Jackson Brainerd won three in a row from 2009-11. Settles finished Saturday's 8K race with a time of 24:23.0.
Fellow senior
Devlin Swanson finished fifth with a time of 24.48.1 and will qualify for the national meet as well if the Tigers are not selected as a team.
The winning team from the 10 regions around the country automatically qualifies for the NCAA Division III National Championship, while the top seven individuals that are not on that team or other teams selected at-large also advance to the national meet. The team and individual selections will be announced on Sunday, Nov. 12.
Pomona-Pitzer took the team title with 45 points, followed by Claremont Mudd-Scripps (93), George Fox (104) and Colorado College (121). CC's fourth-place finish is the best since winning the title in 2011.
In addition to Settles and Swanson, freshman
Will Shuflit also earned all-region honors with a 30
th place finish in 25:33.5. Seniors
Brett Kitazono and
Ayden Cherry rounded out the scoring for the Tigers by placing 42
nd and 49
th, respectively.
"James and Devlin ran amazing races at the front and really set the team up for success," head coach
Alex Nichols said. "We came in hoping to finish fourth or better, so to see our goal achieved was fantastic. I feel very good about our chances of being selected for the national championship field."
The NCAA Division III National Championship is scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 18, in Carlisle, Pa.
NCAA Division III Men's Cross Country West Region Team Scores
1. Pomona-Pitzer - 45
2. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps - 93
3. George Fox - 104
4. Colorado College - 121
5. UC Santa Cruz - 132
6. Caltech - 201
7. Pacific Lutheran - 214
8. Trinity (Tex.) - 249
9. Lewis & Clark - 250
10. La Verne - 250
11. Whitworth – 275
12. Redlands - 296
13. Occidental – 316
14. UT-Dallas – 393
15. Linfield - 434
16. Whitman – 450
17. Chapman - 476
18. Southwestern - 533
19. McMurry – 538
20. Willamette - 540
21. St. Thomas (TX) - 570
22. Cal Lutheran - 623
Colorado College Individual Results (8K)
