BILLINGS, MONT. – The University of Alaska Anchorage had two men and two women run to All-Region honors at the NCAA West Regional Cross Country Championships Saturday.
John Peckham finished eighth (30:44), and Zach Grams placed 21st (31:16) in the men's 10-kilometer race and earned all-region accolades.
Nell Baker and Alexandra Otto each earned all-region honors after placing 15th (21:31) and 20th (21:38) in the women's six-kilometer race.
"I am really proud of this crew today," said associate head coach Chas Davis. "Our women left everything out there for each other and it showed the GNAC meet was no fluke. Today was our best team finish at the regional since 2019. Today was really rewarding as a coach to watch the program go from not scoring as a team my first year here in 2021, placing 22nd in 2022, 12th last year & now 6th. They've earned this.
"We have a much younger team on the men's side and it showed in the four freshmen's first 10k. But I knew if we could just equal our first regional rank of the season in 10th and put someone in contention to qualify for NCAA's it would be a solid day - and that's what we did. Thrilled to see John Peckham's come back from a broken foot last spring to finishing eighth today - potentially qualifying him for nationals."
Ryann Smith finished 48th (22:17), followed by Lilli Lindner in 62nd (22:31) and Avery Williamson was 65th (22:33).
The UAA women finished sixth out of 28 teams. The sixth-place finish was the highest regional finish for the Seawolves since 2019 when they finished fourth.
Ty Elliott finished 48th (31:54), with Sam Roy and Edgar Vera placing 88th (32:51) and 108th (33:27).
The men finished 10th out of 22 teams.
UAA will find out Monday if they earned an at-large selection to the NCAA National Championships.
