Meet Recap: 2024 NAIA Cross Country Championships

Champions were crowned on Friday at the 2024 NAIA Cross Country Championships!

The meet was held at the Gans Creek Cross Country Course in Columbia, Missouri.

From The USTFCCCA InfoZone: Meets & Results | USTFCCCA Scoreboard
Related: National Championships Central | Rankings & Polls Central

Men’s 8k Race

It was championship time again for the College of Idaho – but the first for the men.

A year after the Coyotes’ women’s team won the school’s first cross country team title, the men followed suit this time. With 87 points, the No. 1 Yotes turned back defending champion No. 2 Milligan (Tenn.), which tallied 96 points for their fourth-straight top-2 finish.

Daniel Butler led Idaho with a sixth-place finish, followed by fellow scorers Hayden Bostrom (11^th), Elias Everist (13^th), Brevin Vaughan (26^th) and Oclen Ryan (47^th). The Coyotes’ previous best men’s finish at nationals was fourth in 2016.

No. 6 Cumberlands (Ky.) was third with 155 points with No. 3 The Master’s (Calif.) (189) and No. 8 Indiana Wesleyan (253) rounding out the top-5.

Individually, Evert Silva of Oklahoma City was looking for more than victory.

Silva took control just before the 1k split and ran away to triumph in 23:14.0, winning by 30.3 seconds and matching the meet’s best-ever time at the 8k distance set in 1996 by Silah Misoi of Life (Ga.). Silva’s margin of victory was the largest since 2011, when Kennedy Kithuka of Wayland Baptist (Texas) won by 44 seconds over Silas Kisorio of Oklahoma Christian.

Demetris Love of Embry-Riddle (Ariz.) earned runner-up honors in 23:44.2 ahead of Youssef Asslouj of Cumberlands, Jack Anderson of The Master’s and Bryn Woodall of Milligan as the top-5 all clocked sub-23:50 times.

Women’s 6k Race

Just one point separated the top two teams, which also featured the top-2 individuals.

Teamwise, it was No. 4 The Master’s (Calif.) edging No. 1 Taylor (Ind.), 92-93, in winning their first-ever team title and improving on the Mustangs’ runner-up finish last year. For the Trojans, which last won in 2022, it was a fifth-straight top-5 finish. The one-point differential was the meet’s closest ever in women’s competition.

The battle was tight throughout, with Taylor leading at the first five kilometer splits and holding a 92-101 edge after 5k. The Master’s finished with three top-9 scorers – runner-up Hannah Fredericks along with Ellen Palmgren (eighth) and Emma Nelson (ninth) followed by Suzie Johnson (37^th) and Rebekah Niednagel (42^nd) with places 2-8-9-34-39 in scoring. Both Nelson and Johnson improved five places in the last kilometer to have a major effect on the final result.

Taylor’s top-3 were in the top-7 led by individual champ Jaynie Halterman and the 6-7 finish of sisters Ahna Neideck and Noel VanderWall. Their final scoring was 1-6-7-38-41.

No. 3 Saint Mary (Kan.) was third with 125 points, just ahead of No. 2 Milligan (Tenn.), which had 129. No. 5 Montreat (N.C.) completed the top-5 with 176 points.

The individual race was also close – but only for about the first 4k, when Halterman started to enlarge her slim lead over Fredericks. That margin grew to 20.7 seconds at the finish, with Halterman completing an impressive undefeated freshman season in 20:24.7. It was Fredericks’ first loss to an NAIA runner all year.

Katie Woods of Marian (Ind.) was third, also running sub-21 at 20:56.9, followed in the top-5 by Heather Murphy of Montreat and Ellen-Mary Kearney of Milligan.