The Waynesburg University men’s cross country team traveled to Newville to participate in the NCAA Division III Mideast Regional Championship this past Saturday, Nov. 11, where it placed 32nd out of 51 teams.

The regional meet, which was the team’s last meet of the season, saw seven Yellow Jackets participate in the event. Although the team did not place in the upper half of the standings, head coach Chris Hardie was still pleased with the team’s progress.

“I think they performed very well,” said Hardie. “It’s a pretty young team, so I think a lot of it for them was to get the experience in this race, and for five of them it was their first regional race, so I don’t think we had really high expectations.”

Freshman Nate Jecelin crossed the line first for the Yellow Jackets with a time of 27:28, which was good enough for 116th out of 365 runners. Junior Jacob Pryor finished 161st place, recording a time of 28:01.

“I ran the best race of my season, and this is my first career cross country season here,” said Jecelin. “I was really happy about that, and finishing first overall on the team made me happy.”

Freshman Mac Colomb rounded out the top three for the Yellow Jackets with a mark of 28:07, which was good enough for 170th overall. Freshman Matt Durgin finished 207th overall with a time of 28:40.

“I think I performed pretty well,” said Pryor. “I ran there my freshman year and I took off 40 seconds off my best time on that course from freshman year to this year, so I was pretty happy with that.”

Sophomore Mason Klopp rounded out the top five for the Yellow Jackets, with a time of 29:19. Freshman Jordan Payne finished sixth overall for Waynesburg, recording a time of 29:25. Freshman Kyle Warmbein finished 259th overall and posted a time of 29:48.

Saturday, the team showed some positives, which Hardie said is a good sign for them to build on for the upcoming season.

“I think that this team is starting to see the depth, especially with the freshman class,” said Hardie. “For the third race in a row there was a new leader that took the lead for Waynesburg, which shows how much depth this team has, and really shows the type of potential they have if they can walk in and start to be a little more consistent from race to race.”

One thing that is really eye opening is that 22 out of the 24 runners can return for the upcoming 2018 men’s cross country season. Eric Brownfield and Matthew Shinkle are the two seniors that plan to graduate at the end of this school year.

Brownfield and Shinkle brought a leadership presence to this team and were captains of this team during the season, according to Hardie.

“They brought a calming presence, so they were never too high or never too low,” Hardie said. “They always came to work every day and were very good teammates that were really consistent out there in terms of practice, and what they did on race days is what we are going to miss out of them for sure.”

The Waynesburg men’s cross country team plans on working hard during the offseason, so it can make a push for the Presidents’ Athletic Conference next year.

“I should probably train a lot more than what I have in the past few summers,” said Pryor. “I should maybe get in some more miles.”