By Dave Hunter (dhunter)

VU advances to NJCAA finals.....

            Lansing, Mich., Oct. 27 – The Vincennes University men’s cross country team finished third in the NJCAA Region 12 Cross Country meet held Saturday at Grand Woods Park in Lansing, Mich.

            Host Lansing swept the field by capturing the top five spots on the 8K course and scored 15 points. Jackson, Mich., CC was a distant second with 80 points while VU tallied 109.

            “It was no surprise,” said VU coach Chris Gafner. “They’ve won the meet each year since 1996.”

            The 16 ^th ranked Blazers qualified seven runners for the national meet which will be held Nov. 10 at Rend Lake College in Ina., Ill.

            VU’s top runner was freshman Tyler Kent (Brookston, Ind., Frontier HS) who finished sixth overall in a time of 26:41. His time was 1:10 behind meet champion Rex Kiptuli and seven seconds off the fifth place pace of David Weeks.

            “We really didn’t have our best meet,” Gafner said. “We were hoping for second which is where we were ranked going in, but I’d rather have a bad meet now and do well in the nationals.”

            Blazer sophomore James Ground (Brazil, Ind., Northview HS) finished 10 ^th (27:24) followed by freshman Matt Mitchell (Ft. Wayne Snider), 29 ^th (29:22), freshman Ben Gessner (Celestine, Ind., NE Dubois HS), 31 ^st (29:29) and freshman Sean Dietrich (LaPorte, Ind., HS), 33 ^rd (29:41) to round-out the VU scoring.

            Freshman Mike Roark (Evansville Central), 35 ^th (29:43), sophomore Alan Wonning (Vincennes, Ind., South Knox HS) finished 36 ^th (30:36), freshman Logan Gehlhausen (Perry Central HS), 44 ^th (30:54), freshman Kevin Selby (Washington, Ind., HS), 46 ^th (31:08), sophomore John Taylor (Newburgh, Ind., Castle HS), 47 ^th (31:14), sophomore Andy Hiatt (Franklin, Ind., Indian Creek HS), 54 ^th (32:52), freshman Jay Woods (Olney, Ill., Edwards County HS), 55 ^th (32:56).

            “Most of our guys ran about one minute slower that their last meet,” Gafner said. “The course was a little muddy, but it didn’t make that much difference.”

            Freshman Mallory Brosmer (Huntingburg, Ind., Forest Park HS) was the only runner for the Lady Blazers, finishing 41 ^st overall (23:57) in the women’s 5K race won by Amanda Langell of Lansing (19:09), which also captured the team title.