Men's team finishes a school best sixth at regionals, women place eighth
ALLENTOWN, Pa. - The Salisbury University men's cross country team finished just out of the top five in the final standings at the 2007 NCAA Division III Mideast Regional on Saturday afternoon at Muhlenberg College. The silver lining for the Sea Gulls is that their sixth place region finish out of 41 teams is the best ever in school history as SU finished with 251 points. The Salisbury women's team finished eighth with 297 points out of 37 teams.

Haverford, the top men's team in the Mideast region, won the event with 45 points. Allegheny finished second with 52 points followed by Carnegie Mellon (71 points), Dickinson (108) and Johns Hopkins (185). The Haverford and Allegheny men's teams automatically advance to next weekend's NCAA national championship. Carnegie Mello, Dickinson and Johns Hopkins will be placed in an at-large pool.

The Sea Gulls were led once again by senior Eric Graves who finished the 8K race with a time of 25:38 in 27th place. Graves went out fast but was able to regroup and finish hard. Graves earned Mideast All-Region honors for his finish. He will now wait until tomorrow afternoon to see if he has been selected to receive a spot in the NCAA national championship field as an individual participant. The official announcement will be made on www.ncaasports.com at 3 p.m. (EST).

Freshman Chris Barnard was the second Sea Gull to cross the finish line with a personal record time of 26:11 in 39th place. Senior Buck Stokes and junior Zack Dickerson ran together as the two crossed one second apart from one another. Stokes finished in 56th place with a time of 26:34 and Dickerson posted a personal best time of 26:35 in 57th place. The fifth runner for the men's team was freshman Sam Boimov, who also posted a personal record with a time of 26:44 in 72nd place. Barnard and Boimov made the Mideast Region Top 14 All-Freshman team.

On the women’s side, junior Kelly Sullivan was the top Sea Gull as she finished the 6K race with a time of 22:56 to finish 32nd overall. Sullivan was named to the Mideast All-Region team for her finish. Senior Casey McInerny was right behind Sullivan in 38th place with a time of 23:07. Fellow senior Zuzka O'Zwoldike ran a strong race as she finished 70th (23:45) in her final cross country race as a Sea Gull. Freshman Kristin Stromberg was the fourth Sea Gull to cross the finish line in 82nd place (23:54) and was closely followed by junior Amy DeMichele in 86th place (23:57).

Dickinson College won the women's event by a large margin with 53 points as the second place team, Haverford, had more than double that amount with 110 points.

The 2007 NCAA Division III men's and women's cross country championships will take place next Saturday, November 17, at the Skoglund Athletic Fields in Northfield, Minn., hosted by St. Olaf College.