Men's Cross Country Places Sixth at Regional Championships; Paul Thistle Headed to National Meet
BETHLEHEM, Pa. -- Susquehanna University's men's cross country team placed sixth out of 45 schools at the 2009 NCAA Division III Mideast Region championships, held on Lehigh University's Goodman Campus on Nov. 14.
Susquehanna scored 201 team points, while Allegheny College took the regional championship with 59 points.
SU's senior Paul Thistle (Blue Bell, Pa./Wissahickon) finished 13th individually out of 314 runners with a time of 25 minutes, 28.7 seconds on the 8,000-meter course, 34.4 seconds behind the first-place finisher from Allegheny. Thistle earned all-region honors for his performance. He must wait until Sunday, Nov. 15, to see if his performance is good enough to qualify for the national championships. The at-large qualifiers will be posted on NCAA.com, starting at 3 p.m. that day.
Teammate, junior and fellow all-region honoree Mike Harahan (Downingtown, Pa./Downingtown West) placed 35th overall with a time of 26:12.1. Classmate Robert Steffen (New Castle, Del./Caravel Academy) earned a 37th-place finish with a 26:14.0 time, while junior David Haklar (Coopersburg, Pa./Southern Lehigh) recorded a time of 26:34.7 to place 53rd. Sophomore Ian Quinlan (Eagle View, Pa./Methacton) was Susquehanna's fifth-best finisher, grabbing 63rd place overall in 26:42.0.
**UPDATE: Thistle has
been invited to represent the Susquehanna men at the national
meet.
Next Meet: Saturday, Nov. 21, at NCAA Division III
championships-indiv. (Highland Park Golf Course; Cleveland, Ohio),
12 p.m.