RSC Men's XC qualifiers OCU, Point Park & individuals competing at NAIA Nationals
RSC Men's XC qualifiers OCU, Point Park & individuals competing at NAIA Nationals
MEET INFO l NAIA QUALIFIERS l LIVE RESULTS l NAIA NETWORK l NAIA CROSS COUNTRY
VANCOUVER, Wash. -- River States Conference men's cross country will be respresented with two full teams and six individual qualifiers representing three other schools at the NAIA Men's Cross Country National Championship meet Nov. 18 in Vancouver, Wash.
Ohio Christian University leads the RSC contingent into nationals as RSC champion. The Trailblazers earned their first team qualification to nationals since joining the NAIA in 2015. This year was just the second year OCU was eligible for NAIA postseason. The OCU team features four all-conference runners including first teamers Kyle Benecke, Joel Rodgers and Jonathan Gardner.
Point Park (Pa.) University is also at NAIAs as a team by virture of its RSC runner-up finish. The Pioneers are making their second team appearance at the national meet, and their second since 2015. Point Park had three all-conference performers overall led by first-team member Xavier Stephens, a sophomore.
The RSC also qualified its top six individual finishers from the conference meet who were not from champion OCU or runner-up Point Park. Those six runners also needed to be in the top 20 conference placements overall, and the group of six all made it within the top 11 RSC finishers.
University of Rio Grande (Ohio) claimed three of the six individual qualifications with Kameron Carpenter, Mohammedo Farah and River Spicer. WVU Tech earned two qualifications with RSC champ Robert Jones and teammate Michael Ecker-Randolph, also a first-team all-conference pick. The final national qualifier from the RSC is IU East's Cole Dudley.
The NAIA National Championship is being held at the Fort Vancouver Historic Site in Vancouver, Wash. The host of the meet is the Cascade Collegiate Conference. The men's 8,000-meter race is at 10:30 a.m. PT / 1:30 p.m. ET. Live results will be available at OnlineResults.com. Video will be available for the awards ceremony following the race at NAIANetwork.com