FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - Even though both of the ACU cross country teams fell just short of their goals on Friday, both the women and men improved over last year's performance at the South Central Region Championships.
The ACU women finished just outside the top-20, as they finished in 21
st place (26
th last year), just a few points behind the University of North Texas in 20
th. ACU did finish ahead of WAC rival Tarleton State and future UAC conference foe Little Rock. Chloe McClellan led the way for the 'Cats, as she has in the last three races leading up to this race, with freshman
Saylor Stevenson the 2
nd finisher. ACU was never able to overcome the off-season injuries to
Peyton Bornstein (ACU's #3 finisher in this race last year) and
Charley Hamilton.
On the men's side, the Wildcats finished in 15
th place, just a few points behind Tarleton State. The team could not overcome the loss of team leader
Andruw Villa to injury and
Mark Barajas to a race-day illness.
Kevin Castruita was the top Wildcat finisher. A big reason that ACU was able to finish in 15
th place as a team were the efforts of
Vincent Luffey, who moved up 70 places from the first split at 1.6k to the finish;
Mikhail Fortner, who finished 80 places higher than he did in 2024; and Benji Castro, who moved up 48 places from the first split to race's end.
The women's race saw Texas A&M pull an upset as they won the meet after coming in at 3
rd in the most recent regional rankings. LSU garnered the 2
nd automatic spot from the South Central Region going to the national meet. One of the favorites in this race, Tulane, will now have to hope for one of the at-large berths, along with 4
th place finisher Arkansas. The surprise individual winner was Elizabeth Khatevi, from Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
The men's race was a tight team race to the end, as Tulane and Arkansas finish 1-2 with the Green Wave just two points ahead. Texas A&M and Stephen F Austin will have to wait to see if they can get into the field at nationals as an at-large team.
ACU Women: 54.
Chloe McLellan – 22:01; 116.
Saylor Stevenson – 23:05; 138.
Hannah Kasper – 23:35; 147.
Hadley Phillips – 23:52; 158.
Audrey Chitwood – 24:24; 163.
Kate Williams – 24:50; and 166.
Madison Anderson – 24.58.
ACU Men: 62.
Kevin Castruita – 31:57; 76.
Vincent Luffey – 32:12 (PR); 84.
Mikhail Fortner – 32:34; 99.
Benjamin Castro – 32:53 (PR); 100.
Carlos Cortez – 32:53; and 132.
Austin Roberts – 33:44 (PR).
Coach Nathan Meeuwenberg on the men's team:
We took some hits late in the season but there is so much to be happy about. This team is still so young and will keep getting better. I love how resilient the team has become. Yes, we fell short towards the end of the season but some of the first comments were how we are going to change a few things to get better. This team constantly wants to improve!
Coach M on the women's team:
Only one runner from last year's scoring five was in this year's scoring five, so the newness of this team performed well. We placed better than last year and will continue to improve.
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