For the first time in school history Prairie View A&M University won the Southwestern Athletic Conference cross country championship Monday. In convincing fashion, PVAMU captured first, second, third and 10th place finishes en route to a 31 point total, topping the second place team by 23 points.Leading all runners was redshirt freshman Alonzo Thomas with a time of 27:42.92. Teammates Matthew Jones, a freshman, followed with a 28:02.41 and junior Thomas Rivera closed out the dynamic trio with a time of 28:03.51. Sophomore Tyrone Russell closed out the list of top ten performers with a 29:18.16 finish.
“After the second mile I felt good about my chances to finish in front of the pack,” said Thomas. “We have great coaches (Clifton Gilliard and Chris Clay) who prepared us for today’s championship. It feels really great to capture a SWAC title in my first year of competition.”
Gilliard was named SWAC coach of the year while Thomas, Jones and Rivera received first team all-SWAC honors for their outstanding performances. Russell garnered second team honors for his top 10 finish.
“These guys have worked hard all season long,” said Gilliard. “Coming into the meet they had their minds made up that they were going to give their best performance toward winning the conference championship. Our front three have been performing great all year long, but I didn’t think we would be so far ahead.”
Southern finished in second place with 54 points followed by defending champion, Jackson State with 110 points for a third place finish.