Stags Second At West Region Meet, Qualify For NCAA Championships

The third-ranked CMS cross country team turned in their best race of the season at the West Region meet in Salem, OR on Saturday. The Stags scored 83 points to finish second overall.  They qualified for the NCAA Division III Championships for the seventh time in their history.

CMS was led by Florian Scheulen (JR, Encinitas).  He was the top SCIAC finisher in the meet.  He ran a personal best time of 25:05.1 for the eight kilometer distance to finish third overall.  Michael Van Antwerp (SR, Reno, NV) equaled his SCIAC finish of 12th with a time of 25:29.7.  The Stags' next four finished in a bunch with Chris Gurney (SR, Ventura), Bryan Chow (FR, Livermore), Dillon Ayers (SO, Eureka) and Kramer Straube (SO, Menlo Park) finished 21st, 23rd, 24th and 26th respectively in times of 25:42.4, 25:44.2, 25:48.9 and 25:52.0.  All six runners set personal bests and earned All-Region honors by finishing in the top 35.  Brian Kopczynski (SO, Coto de Caza) ran his fastest time of the season (26:27.1) to finish 43rd.

The Championship meet will be hosted by Hanover College in Hanover, IN this Saturday at 11:00. CMS will be one of 32 teams competing in the meet with a total of 280 athletes running. CMS moved up to 27th in final national rankings after being ranked 38th prior to the regional.

Complete meet results can be found here: 2008 West Regional