Photo by: Henoc Kivuye
The NCCAA National Championship played out similar to the cross-country program’s season – the Eagles posted solid finishes, but battled steady winds the whole way through.
Prior to the race, sophomore Bryant Keirns felt the squads’ chances on the course were fair, provided nothing too crazy happened.
“It feels pretty good – it feels like things are coming together finally,” Keirns said. “So long as nothing goes wrong during the race; we’ve had people deal with injuries, and people getting in pretty good workouts, so we should be alright.”
Pushing against persistent 15-20 mph winds, the men took fourth place while the Lady Eagles finished 21st. Keirns qualified for All-America honors, and Oklahoma Christian University brought home national Scholar-Athlete honors for the 13th straight year across both squads. Head Coach for Men’s Cross-Country Wade Miller admitted the injuries hampered the squad, but did not quench the team’s work ethic.
“We’re disappointed we didn’t win, but we had just a little bit too much to overcome this year,” Miller said. “I think just overall kind of understanding from my perspective that they worked really hard this season and ran hard, you know, it’s just going forward from here. I’ve got high expectations and high hopes, I guess you could say, for the future.”
Oklahoma Christian battled injuries all season long. Sophomore Tara Lewis, who led the women’s squad as a freshman, sat out the latter half of the season due to injury. Junior Roberto Diaz spent the majority of the fall proving his mettle as one of the Eagles’ top runners, but a late foot injury slowed him down in the season’s home stretch. Lagging in nationals, Diaz found himself almost dropping out of the race entirely.
“At the beginning of the fifth mile I was thinking about dropping out completely, but Trent [Stephens] ended up being the first one to come back up, and he gave me a little tap and told me to keep going,” Diaz said. “He yelled at me and told me that this wasn’t me, that this wasn’t who I was and I needed to be up there and give it my all, and I still could push through the pain no matter what.”
Sophomore Trent Stephens took a spike to the foot shortly before catching up to Diaz, racing with his shoe practically falling apart. After the encouragement from Stephens, and finding additional galvanization from Miller, Diaz pushed and eventually passed Stephens.
“Somehow, someway we still got fourth place, even though our entire group had to push through problems,” Diaz said. “Basically, Bryant and Trent were the only ones who had decent races – and Trent got spiked in the foot, and still ran a heck of a race. I know the other guys were all having issues, and it was a tough course. I’m proud of the guys.”
Keirns achieved a career-first, leading the Eagles in the 231-man field with a fifth place finish in 26:01.54 – earning him All-America honors and continuing the Eagles’ seven-year streak. Junior Brennym Kaelin ran the closest, taking 37th in 26:48. Diaz and Stephens stayed close, taking 46th in 27:01.64 and 48th 27:02.94 respectively.
Sophomore Timothy Zuercher finished in 27:27.23 for 68th, and senior Nick Stoots claimed 71st in 27:29.10. Freshman Evan Durrill brought up the rear, keeping Oklahoma Christian’s men all in the top 100 with a time of 27:53.19 for 89th place. The Eagles logged a team score of 188.
Azusa Pacific University earned the team title, but Trinity Christian College’s Andrew Reidsma won the individual championship title with a time of 25:13.36.
Both Kaelin and Zuercher brought home NCCAA Scholar-Athlete honors for the men, while junior Tavia Hoheisel claimed the honor for the Lady Eagles. In order to qualify, a student-athlete must be a junior and hold at least a 3.4 GPA.
Freshmen Layne Hammer and Katie Jones led the Lady Eagles to their 21st-place team finish, taking the 93rd (20:34.25) and 97th (20:36.97) places respectively in the 227-woman race. Jones broke her career-high, also posting her first second-place finish within the Oklahoma Christian women’s squad. Freshman Sarah Cobb nearly posted a career-high as well, coming in 137th with a time of 21:17.19. Fellow freshman Maci Rich followed in 150th, finishing in 21:44.40. The upperclassmen rounded out Oklahoma Christian, as sophomore Maria Sargent took 172nd in 22:27.94 and Hoheisel finished 193rd in 23:37.08.
The Lady Eagles posted a team score of 614. Miller saw the race as a solid steppingstone for the immediate future.
“We had a couple girls run really well, and a lot of freshmen really extended their season from high school,” Miller said. “They all ran tough, and we would have liked to run a little better, finish a little bit higher, but overall it’s a good starting point for sure.”
Despite a scarce presence in the top 100, Oklahoma Christian posted their second-best team finish in the program’s five trips to nationals. At their best performance, the Lady Eagles took 14th in the 2005 NAIA national championship.
The season may be over, but the cross-country program’s work is far from done. Because of the high return rate of runners for next season, the Eagles are looking towards the long-term, especially Diaz.
“It’s not given,” Diaz said. “We have to earn it, we have to earn everything. Even though we did face adversity, it’s going to take working twice as hard, and stretching twice as much to do all those little things that wind up making us champions in the end.”
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