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Mountain West Conference To Send Three Teams, Five Individuals to NCAA Cross Country Championship
Nov. 13, 2007 COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - Three Mountain West Conference teams and five individuals will represent the Conference at the 2007 NCAA Cross Country Championships to be held Nov. 19, in Terre Haute, Ind. The Colorado State women's and BYU men's and women's teams each qualified based on their respective performances at the Mountain Regionals, Nov. 10, hosted by Weber State. Air Force's Matt Williams, New Mexico's Jeremy Johnson, TCU's Festus Kigen, and Wyoming's Mark Korir and Gretchen Fagley-Johnson also were selected to compete individually. The BYU men's team is headed to its ninth straight NCAA Championship as a member of the MWC. The Cougars received an at-large bid after finishing fourth as a team behind Colorado, Texas-El Paso and Northern Arizona. Senior Chandler Goodwin led the Cougars, finishing 11th (30:45.2) in the 10K race. Johnson, the 2007 MWC Men's Runner of the Year, placed third overall at the Mountain Regionals to earn his first career position in the NCAA field with a time of 29:57.0. Korir finished fifth with a time of 30:15.8 and will be making his second consecutive individual appearance at the NCAA Championship after collecting all-American honors with a 22nd-place finish in last year's event. Air Force will be represented at the NCAA Championship for the first time since the Falcons' 2004 campaign by Williams, who finished 19th (31:06.8) at the Mountain Regionals. Kigen finished 10th (30:04.3) overall in the Nov. 10, South Central Regionals, hosted by the University of Arkansas, to earn his bid. On the women's side, Colorado State will be making its sixth appearance at the NCAA Championship as a member of the MWC. The Rams placed five runners in the top-20 in the 6K race at the Mountain Regionals, led by 2007 MWC Women's Runner of the Year April Thomas, who ran the course in 21:00.0 to finish fifth overall. The BYU women, winners of the 1999, 2001 and 2002 national championships, will be making their ninth straight NCAA appearance. Freshmen Angela Wagner and Cecily Lemmon finished ninth (21:12.1) and 12th (21:16.5), respectively, to lead the Cougars. Fagley-Johnson placed 10th in that same race (21:13.3) to earn her way as an individual runner. The NCAA selects 31 teams for each of the men's and women's national meets, automatically qualifying the top two teams from each of the nine regions. Thirteen additional squads receive at-large invitations. Thirty-eight runners, including the top four from each region who were not part of a qualifying team, plus two additional at-large runners, are selected. Individuals must place in the top-25 in their respective region to be eligible for selection to compete in the NCAA Championships. Last year, former BYU standout Josh Rohatinsky became the first MWC student-athlete to win an individual championship, capturing the NCAA men's individual crown with a time of 30:44.9.
The 2007 NCAA Cross Country Championships will start with the men's race, beginning at 12 p.m. ET, followed by the women's event at 12:55 p.m. ET. Both races will be broadcast live on CSTV.
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