Northampton, Mass. – Clark University posted a sixth place finish at the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) men's cross country championships on Saturday afternoon at the Smith College campus.
Freshman John Allard (Smithfield, R.I.) was the Cougars' top finisher, turning in a 16th place finish over the 8K layout in 27:05.
He was followed by Joe Kennelly (New Windsor, N.Y.), who completed the course in 27:43, good for 29th place.
Nathan Buck (Portland, Maine) was the third Clark runner to cross the finish line, wrapping up in 34th place (28:08).
MIT placed all five of their scoring runners in the top 10 to win their unprecedented 15th consecutive championship.
The Engineers totaled up 33 points, squeezing past second placed Springfield College, who finished with 44 points. WPI came in third with 89 points, followed by Coast Guard with 95 points, Babson with 130 points, Clark (Mass.) with 161 points, and Wheaton (Mass.) with 180 points.
Springfield's Anthony Salvucci (Burlington, Mass.) earned NEWMAC Runner of the Year honors with a first place finish in 25:36, followed by teammate Ryan O'Connell (Middleboro, Mass.) in 25:50. Coast Guard's Gary Ezzo finished third with a time of 25:54, and MIT's Roy Wedge (Lawrence, Kan.) and Ben Mattocks (Sharon, Mass.) rounded out the top five finishers with times of 26:02 and 26:08, respectively.
Ryan Moran (Pembroke, Mass.) of WPI came in sixth in 26:16, followed by a host of MIT runners. Justin Bullock (Detroit, Mich.) was the seventh place finisher with a time of 26:21.41, ahead of Allen Leung (Arcadia, Calif.), who came in eighth place in 26:22.56, and Ian Tolan (Binghamton, N.Y.) was the NEWMAC Rookie of the Year for his ninth place finish in 26:28.27.
The rest of the NEWMAC All-Conference team was comprised of MIT's Edgar Gridello (Douvainer, France), who took 10th place in 26:28, and teammate Matt Jordan (Matthews, N.C.) finished 11th in 26:29. Zach Pietras of Springfield (Ludlow, Mass.) was 12th in 26:29, followed by MIT's Benjie Xie (El Dorado Hills, Calif.) in 26:30 and Logan Trimble (Clearwater, Fla.) in 26:31.
Clark will return to action on Saturday at the New England ECAC Championships.
