UVU campus briefs

CROSS COUNTRY: In the Wolverines' first official NCAA event in school history on Saturday, both teams ran strong but ended up placing a bit short to qualify for the NCAA Championships as they finished in eighth (261 points) and 10th (317 points) places respectively, at the NCAA Mountain Regional hosted by the University of New Mexico.

"The best thing about today was being here," UVU head coach Scott Houle said. "This was the landmark athletic event for our university, no sport or individual has ever been able to do this before. For many, many years people are going to talk about this, as it was our first NCAA activity in school history. It was a very special opportunity for us to be here and I am very pleased that both our teams placed in the top 10."

UVU junior Mary Nothum, who was the Great West Conference Women's Runner of the Year and the Wolverines top female runner all season long, placed 42nd with a time of 22:18.8 to lead the Wolverines in the 6K race. She was followed closely by freshman Brooke Hodson who came in 45th (22:20.8) and junior Aleina Eisenhauer who placed 53rd (22:26.7).

Freshman Shelise Walker placed 56th (22:28.9), sophomore Krystal Harper 65th (22:42.2), Sophomore Angela Baker 73rd (22:53.9), and senior Karinne Bentley finished 90th (23:10.2) in her final collegiate race at UVU.

Utah Valley's men's team, who bumped up to run a 10K for the first time this year, was led by sophomore Joshua McCabe who placed 47th with a time of 32:01.3. Freshman Jason Lynch finished next for UVU at 59th (32:18.3) and was followed by senior Chase Englestead who came in 60th (32:18.8).

Freshman Seth Gutzwiller placed 73rd (32:36.3), senior Jacob Buhler 78th (32:45.4), freshman Chris Brower 90th (33:13.6) and freshman Trac Norris placed 102nd (33:37.9) to round out the Utah Valley men.

The top two teams automatically qualified for nationals (men's: BYU & Colorado/women's: Colorado & Texas Tech) and the first four individuals not on a qualifying team also earned an automatic berth. Generally, two-three additional teams from the Mountain Region have been selected for at-large bids to the NCAA Championships but with the Wolverines finishes, they would be a long shot to make it this year.

Finishing behind Colorado and Texas Tech in the women's race, BYU finished third, UTEP fourth, New Mexico fifth, Colorado State sixth, Northern Arizona seventh, UVU eighth, New Mexico State ninth, Southern Utah 10th, Weber State 11th, Montana 12th, Air Force 13th, Utah State 14th, Idaho State 15th, Nevada 16th, Wyoming 17th, Montana State 18th, Utah 19, and Northern Colorado 20th.