NAU cross country claims first national title in school history

By foxsports
Published

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. -- Futsum Zienasellassie, who redshirted for Northern Arizona last year so he could run the final race of his senior season on the same course where he won three Indiana high school state championships, helped the Lumberjacks claim the first national championship in school history.

Top-ranked Northern Arizona tallied 125 points to runner-up Stanford's 158. Syracuse was third with 164 points.

"This is a dream come true," said Zienasellassie who finished fourth in 29 minutes, 49.8 seconds. "There is nothing like this. I'll trade this for any place. I'm just so happy we won. (Coach Eric) Heins is leaving. I'm done, and we just made history. This is the greatest thing that's happened to me in my life."

On a bitter day that featured 20-mph winds with a wind-chill of 28-degrees, the men packed up early and throughout most of the race. Zienasellassie was in the mix with the leaders until Tiernan and Knight made a move with just over 1,000 meters to go. Cheserek went with them but pulled up and faded. He held off a surge by Zienasellassie late.

"I gave it all I had," Zienasellassie said. "Those guys were just better than me today. I lost to guys that rank as probably some of the best. They're really good. I can't be too mad about that."

Behind Zienasellassie, Matt Baxter, Tyler Day and Andy Trouar -- who each earned All-American honors -- the Lumberjacks bested Stanford and Syracuse to claim first place with 125 points. In fact, NAU outlasted the second-place Cardinal by 33 points and posted its lowest score ever at nationals -- trumping the previous Lumberjacks record of 142 points in 1995.

"I had bad thoughts, honestly, as we were crossing the finish line," NAU coach Eric Heins said. "I heard that we were winning -- but not by much -- at 8K, and I couldn't tell where Nathan (Weitz) had finished. I thought he was our fifth man because I didn't see any of our other athletes pass him. It was nerve-racking."

Baxter came in 11th place, Day was 23rd and Trouard 37th. Cory Glines was the all-important fifth man for the Lumberjacks, hustling his way into 84th place.

Redshirt-senior and four-time NCAA competitor Nathan Weitz finished 95th while redshirt-freshman Geordie Beamish came in 97th.