BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Junior Dillon Farrell of the Moravian College men's cross country team has qualified for the 2013 NCAA National Championships for the second straight year with an 11th place finish out of 365 runners at Saturday's Division III Mideast regional qualifier at Lehigh University's Goodman Campus.
Farrell's time of 25:02 on the 8K course was the third fastest at the distance in school history; however, he was only chasing himself. Farrell now owns the top three 8K times in the record books, and seven of the top nine times.
"This meet is called the NCAA qualifiers, so I can't be too upset with my result," said Farrell, who finished fourth in last season's regional meet. "I'm in, but my goal was to take at least third this year. I could have had a better race. If anything, that makes me an underdog going to nationals, and in that sense, I'm happy because no one is going to be worried about me."
Farrell's finish helped the Greyhound team finish in 26th place out of 54 teams in the NCAA DIII regional. Muhlenberg College, the host of the 2013 event, finished ahead of the Hounds in the team standings, bringing the Mules closer in the Matte Award battle.
While Muhlenberg hosted the event, Farrell felt right at home on a course that would decide the fate of the remainder of his cross country season.
"I've run this course 20 to 30 times in practices and meets," Farrell said. "I had the advantage of what and when to expect the twists and turns of this course. My mind was in the right place for what I had to do today, and when to execute that plan. That really helped my race."
Head coach Jesse Baumann was pleased at the individual efforts on Saturday. Freshman Cory Taggert was the second Greyhound finisher in 148th place with a time of 27:32. Another newcomer, Andrew Reed, turned in a personal record time of 28:11 on Saturday.
Baumann also echoed the notion that Farrell could be at an advantage going into nationals under the radar.
"Finishing high at regions really raises the expectations for nationals," the third-year head coach said. "That's not necessarily a good thing. It's a fine line between confidence and expectations, but he knows he's in the best shape of his life and everything he's accomplished is far beyond where we were last year. He's a gamer; he always shows up when we need him to."
Freshman Andrew Mitchell (28:45), and sophomores Maxwell Korten (28:55) and Jeremy Rigotti (28:56) rounded out the Moravian scorers on Saturday.
Farrell is back in action on Saturday, Nov. 23 at the 2013 NCAA Division III National Championships at Hanover (Ind.) College. The gun sounds at noon as Farrell looks to improve on a 109th place finish from nationals last season.
