IRVINE, Calif. - The Concordia University Irvine cross country teams turned in a pair of Top 10 performances at the NCAA DII West Regional Championships on Saturday up in Oregon.
The CUI women finished eighth out of 28 schools while the men came in ninth out of 23 programs.
Two individual Golden Eagles also flew past the field and emerged as All-Region honorees.Â
The men's squad was led by senior
Noah Plaza, who turned in the best NCAA DII West Regional finish in program history by placing sixth overall. To put it in perspective, there were more than 160 runners in the men's regional race and Plaza was sixth as well as also the top male runner out of
all the PacWest Conference schools.
Plaza notched a personal record with his 10K time of 29 minutes and 41.17 seconds.Â
The next Golden Eagles to cross the line in the regional meet was SAAC representative
Spencer Handorf coming in at 40th.
Handorf finished right behind Plaza in third place at the recent PacWest Conference meet.
Following close behind Handorf was
Moises Benito who joined both his Concordia teammates with PRs on the day. Rounding out the lineup for the Green and Gold were freshmen
Dante Maldonado and
Logan Jones who were within five seconds of each other along with seniors
Marcus Shin &
Gavin Hellerstedt narrowly behind those two. The top five finishers score points for each team.
On the women's side, CUI's
Ania Kapustka blazed to a 15th overall finish which also puts her in as an All-Region runner in 2025. She clocked a time of 21 minutes and 4.16 seconds to etch her name in the CUI record books.
Kapustka was also the seventh PacWest runner to cross the line in the women's race.
Elizabeth King was next and placed in the Top 50, coming in at No. 49, with freshman
Olivia Reed barely nine seconds behind her for third place on the squad. King was the 12th PacWest women's runner in the final tally.
Mariza Chavez and senior
Audrey Barcenas were the final two scoring Golden Eagles for the women as they closed within three seconds of each other and were in 81st and 83rd position, respectively.
Emily Littlefield and freshman
Adamara Esparza were next and also finished about five seconds apart.
The NCAA DII Men's Cross Country National Championship race will be held in Kenosha, Wisconsin on Saturday, Nov. 22.
Plaza will find out on Monday afternoon if he officially has qualified as an individual runner for the NCAA meet.
CLICK HERE for the full CUI men's cross country schedule
CLICK HERE for the full CUI women's cross country schedule
