No. 9 Taylor Finishes Eighth, Claims Second-Best Time in Program History at NAIA Championships
COLUMBIA, Mo. – Ninth-ranked Taylor (102-20) took home eighth place and ran the program's second fastest time of 2:04:36 at the 69th Annual NAIA Men's Cross Country Championship on Friday morning.
TU, which finished with a team score of 280, used a strong finish in the 8k race to jump from 10th place to eighth over the final 2,000 meters. In doing so, the Purple and Grey beat No. 7 Spring Arbor and all three of the 10th-through-12th-ranked teams, and they finished just one spot back of No. 4 The Master's. Top-ranked College of Idaho won the national title.
For the fourth time in six races, Luke Harber led the Trojan charge by taking 25th individually with a time of 24:30.7 for the junior's first All-American placement.
"We are very excited for Luke. He was calm, patient, and ran with joy. He was focused on the task at hand to earn his All-American award," said head coach Quinn White.
Ryan Hanak crossed in 24:46.0 to claim 45th overall for his best finish in his three-year NAIA Championship career.
Alex Ortiz crushed his personal record by coming in at 24:59.3 at 74th overall.
Joel Mumaw also set a PR with his 25:09.0 that placed him inside the top 100 individuals out of 326 participants.
Jared Stayte had TU's third personal best on the day as he rounded out the team's contributing scores with a time of 25:12.0, over 27 seconds faster than his previous PR.
Nathan Burns finished in 25:36.8, and Jordan Burden was right behind at 25:44.6 as the sophomores took 173rd and 192nd overall, respectively.
On the whole, White was very pleased with how the Trojans finished their season.
"The men did a great job of running their race and working up through the crowd," said White, continuing, "Each kilometer they moved up and their last kilometer was outstanding to get them into eighth place. This task was not as easy as people would think as they had to weave through the crowded field. However, their grit and perseverance prevailed to help them finish better than they were ranked."
No. 9 Taylor's eighth-place finish is the program's 11th consecutive top-20 showing at NAIA Nationals, including its fourth top-10 finish in the past six years under White.
