Virginia Places Third at NCAA Southeast Regional Championships
ROCK HILL, S.C. – The Virginia men’s cross country team recorded a third-place finish on Friday (Nov. 9) at the NCAA Southeast Regional Championships at the Winthrop Farm.
Virginia had four of its five scoring runners earn USTFCCCA All-Southeast Region honors by finishing in the top 25 at the meet. Senior Brent Demarest (Charleston, S.C.) led the team with a sixth-place finish, recording a time of 29:56.7. Junior AJ Ernst (Marblehead, Mass.) placed 13th with a time of 30:21.2, while redshirt junior Ari Klau (West Hartford, Conn.) ran a time of 30:31.6 to finish 19th. Redshirt junior Alex Corbett (Burke, Va.) was the fourth Cavalier runner to finish, placing 25th with a time of 30:36.8. Sophomore Rohann Asfaw (Rockville, Md.) rounded out Virginia’s top five runners with a time of 31:02.5 for 39th place.
“We are disappointed to fall short of placing in the top two teams,” head men’s cross country coach Jason Dunn said. “We had guys race tough today and four of our athletes earned all-region honors, three for the first time. But, we needed to close out the race better as a team and we just didn’t get it done.”
NC State won the regional meet and advanced to the NCAA Championships with 83 points. Eastern Kentucky earned the second NCAA berth with a second-place finish (90 points).
The NCAA will announce the 13 at-large selections for the NCAA Championships on Saturday (Nov. 10) at 5 p.m. The NCAA Championships will be held on Nov. 17 in Madison, Wisc.