Last Saturday, the Cardinal cross country teams finished their seasons at the NCAA Championship in Louisville, with the No. 3 men faltered a bit en route to a 16th place finish, and the No. 4 women finding their way back to the podium with a third-place effort.
The Pac-12 Championship brought out the best in both Stanford cross country teams on Saturday, as they scored 82 points each to earn top-three finishes at the Robinson Ranch Golf Course in Santa Clarita, Calif.
Former Georgetown track and field associate head coach Chris Miltenberg will be the new Franklin P. Johnson Director of Track & Field and Stanford cross-country head coach, officially announced by Stanford athletic director Bernard Muir on Monday.
Over the next 5,000 meters, No. 2 Oklahoma State, No. 6 Colorado and No. 3 BYU all snuck past Stanford to knock head coach Jason Dunn’s team off the podium by a mere four points. But senior Chris Derrick ran one of the best races of his already impressive collegiate career, outkicking Iona’s Leonard Korir down the stretch to match Ryan Hall ’05 and Neftalem Araia ’08 for the best NCAA position in Stanford history with a runner-up finish in the individual race
With the cross country season finished just a week ago, the Stanford teams were well-represented on the Pac-12 All-Academic teams. Leading the way were senior Chris Derrick and redshirt junior Miles Unterreiner, who were two of the 10 runners selected for the men’s first team
For the past four years, senior Chris Derrick’s dream has been to help his men’s cross country team win an NCAA championship. After three top-10 finishes for the team–both of which came with the Cardinal entering the championship meet ranked No. 1 in the country and included top-seven finishes for Derrick–it’s now or never for the Naperville, Ill. native who will lead No. 6 Stanford into battle on Monday against one of the strongest fields in recent years in Terre Haute, Ind.
Running in front of a home crowd for the final time in their careers, the men’s cross country senior trio of Chris Derrick, Jake Riley and Brendan Gregg all cruised to top-10 finishes at the NCAA West Regional Championships on Saturday.
In a finish that was even tighter on the course than it was on paper, the Buffaloes took the men’s team title with 46 points, seven better than Stanford’s total of 53