Nov. 24, 2008

Final Men's Results

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. - Junior Matt Llano finished 176th overall, posting a 10K time of 31:29.6 Monday at the NCAA Cross Country National Championship hosted by Indiana State University in Terre Haute, Ind. Llano was the first Spider runner in 29 years to compete for the National Title.

Llano's time was two-and-half minutes back of the individual National Championship - Galen Rupp of Oregon (29:03.2), who used a late-race charge to pull past Liberty's Samuel Chelanga. The top-40 runners in the race earned All-America distinction and Llano's time was less than 90 seconds from that mark.

Rupp helped lead Oregon to the men's team title, followed by Iona, Stanford, Wisconsin and Auburn in the top five. The field consisted of 252 men's Division-I runners.

In chilly and windy conditions, the junior from Arnold, Md. took the race out in 8:55 over the first 3K, hit the half-way mark at 15:22 and was clocked at 25:03 through 8K.

The race caps memorable junior campaign for the Llano, who was an All-Conference performer as the runner-up at the Atlantic 10 Championship, finished seventh overall at the NCAA Southeast Regional, earned the Spiders' first Men's Cross Country National Championship berth in three decades, was named A-10 Academic All-Conference and voted the A-10 Men's Cross Country Student-Athlete of the Year.