Air Force Academy
NCAA Mountain Regional
Riley Coates Paces Falcons at NCAA Regional Championships
11/14/2014 12:00:00 AM | Cross Country
In the first 10K event of the 2014 season, Coates clocked a career-best time of 30:20.93 - the Academy's ninth-fastest time in the last 20 years - to finish 19th and capture all-region honors.
Senior Zach Perkins finished 27th with a time of 30:32.56 (the 15th-fastest 10K in recent Academy history), while junior Patrick Corona placed 37th with a time of 30:59.49. The Falcons' final two scoring finishers - junior Daniel Shellhouse and sophomore Kyle Eller - finished 59th (31:50.90) and 60th (31:51.76), respectively.
Junior Dan Caddigan and freshman Andrew Johnston also competed at New Mexico's North Golf Course, making their 10K debuts at the regional meet. Caddigan finished 66th with a time of 31:55.76, while Johnston finished 72nd in 32:11.55.
The Falcons tallied 202 points to finish ninth in the team standings of the mountain regional. Top-ranked Colorado State placed all five scoring runners in the top 13 to win the regional title with 45 points, while No. 10 Northern Arizona earned the other automatic bid to the NCAA Championships after finishing second with 68 points. No. 15 BYU (121 points), No. 30 Southern Utah (128) and unranked Colorado State (140) rounded out the top five.
"Our two seniors did a strong job of setting the tone for our team," head coach Ryan Cole said. "There's a great chance Riley Coates individually qualified for the NCAA Championships and that's extremely well deserved; and Zach Perkins also had arguably the best cross country race of his Air Force career. As a team, we have very high expectations and it's always tough when those expectations aren't met. But we were in the NCAA qualifying conversation this season and the guys are determined to be vying for a spot at the NCAA Championships every year."
The women were led by junior Hannah Everson, who clocked a 6K time of 22:29.55 to finish 53rd among 133 runners. Freshmen Carina Gillespie and sophomore Lindy Long also finished within the top half of the field, placing 60th (22:39.03) and 64th (22:43.87), respectively. Freshman Nicole Hahn placed 93rd with a time of 23:10.64 and senior Rebecca Esselstein rounded out the Falcons' scoring contingent with a 115th-place time of 23:42.19.
Freshman Katie Burnham and senior Taylor Drolshagen also participated in the race, finishing 127th (25:30.71) and 128th (25:45.54), respectively.
Air Force totaled 385 points to finish 15th in the regional meet. Colorado, ranked 12th in the national standings, earned five top-13 finishes to claim the regional title with 43 points, while ninth-ranked New Mexico finished second with 56 points. Three unranked teams - BYU (112), Northern Arizona (149) and Wyoming (157) - rounded out the top five.
"Today was a very tough day for us," Cole said. "Our girls did a great job managing adversity throughout the season, but at some point it all catches up with you. Unfortunately, that day was today. But, the girls are resilient and will be stronger from the experiences they had this season."
The 2014 season comes to a close on Saturday, Nov. 22, at the NCAA Cross Country Championships. An official list of participants will be announced tomorrow.
Players Mentioned
