CCC Cross Country Championships Slated for Saturday in Seattle
SEATTLE, Wash. -- Automatic berths to the NAIA Championships will be on the line Saturday at Lincoln Park in Seattle, as the Cascade Collegiate Conference conducts championships in men’s and women’s cross country. The top finishing team in each race will earn the league’s automatic bid to the national meet, which is slated for Nov. 22 in Kenosha, Wis.
There figures to be hotly contested battles on both the men’s and women’s sides. Three men’s teams and two women’s teams are expected to maintain national Top 25 rankings when final regular season polls are released by the national office on Tuesday. Last week, on the men’s side, SOU (5), College of Idaho (14) and Concordia (16) were listed among the nation’s Top 25; on the women’s side, College of Idaho (12) and Concordia (22) were nationally ranked, with Evergreen receiving votes.
The women's 5K race begins at 11 a.m.; the men's 8K race follows at 11:45 a.m. Last year's individual league champions -- Kory Humberston (Oregon Tech) on the men's side and Stephanie Helm (College of Idaho) on the women's -- are back to defend their crowns.
Eastern Oregon is the defending champion in both the men's and women's meet.
A total of 32 men's and 32 women's teams will qualify for the NAIA Championships -- 25 automatic qualifiers on the men's side and 26 on the women's side. The remainder of each field will be filled with at-large entrants based on final national rankings, which are tabulated after the Nov. 8 qualifying meets. In addition, the top five individuals not on an advancing team -- either automatic or at-large -- will qualify for the national championships, as long as they finish among the top 15 at the CCC meet.
Click here for this week's CCC cross country report.
A look at previous CCC cross country team champions:
| Year |
Men |
Women |
| 1994 |
Eastern Oregon |
George Fox |
| 1995 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 1996 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 1997 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 1998 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 1999 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 2000 |
Eastern Oregon |
Northwest |
| 2001 |
Eastern Oregon |
Northwest |
| 2002 |
Eastern Oregon |
Northwest |
| 2003 |
Eastern Oregon |
Northwest |
| 2004 |
Southern Oregon |
Northwest |
| 2005 |
Southern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |
| 2006 |
Concordia |
Corban |
| 2007 |
Eastern Oregon |
Eastern Oregon |