SACRAMENTO, CALIF – UNC Pembroke's Joshua Chepkesir finished eighth while the Augusta Jaguars were ninth as a team at the NCAA Division II Men's Cross Country National Championship on Saturday in Sacramento. 

Chepkesir became just the second student-athlete in the history of the UNC Pembroke cross country program to post a sub-30-minute time in the 10K on the way to finishing 8^th at the NCAA Division II National Championships in northern California on Saturday.
 
Chepkesir registered a personal best time of 29:55.9 at the event and finished just 24 seconds off of the pace of national champion Ezra Mutai of American International. Chepkesir was among the top 3 runners through the first 9.1 kilometers (5.65 miles) before losing a tiny bit of ground down the stretch.
 
He led the race at the 2.3K (1.43 miles) mark, and was among the top-2 runners through 5.7K (3.54 miles).
 
Saturday's result marked just the fifth top-10 finish for a Peach Belt Conference student-athlete in the 30-year history of the league, but the first since Columbus State's Meshack Koyiaki tallied a runner-up showing at the 2010 championships. His performance marked the best result for a UNCP runner at the NCAA Division II National Championships since former all-American Garry Henry won the national championship in 1980.
 
Chepkesir's time was nearly a minute faster than previous performance by a PBC student-athlete at the event. The mark was just 33 seconds (29:32) off of Henry's school-record mark that was established at the 1980 NCAA Championships.

Augusta's ninth-place finish is tied for the best any PBC men's team has ever done at the NCAA nationals.  The 2003 Kennesaw State team also finished in ninth.

On Saturday, the Jaguars placed four of their scoring runners in the top 75, finishing with 332 points, just behind Queens (N.C.) in eighth.  Colorado Mines won the national championship with 57 points, Adams State was second with 136.

Jacob Poston led the Jaguars with a 48^th-place finish in a time of 30:57.3.  Chase Kennedy was 10 spots behind with a time of 31:05.6 and Jacob Burgamy 77^th in 31:19.4. 

Chandler Kennedy finished 86^th in 31:26.0 and Kai Brickey rounded out the AU scoring runners in a time of 31:49.7.

Also running as an individual was Flagler's Marcus Graham, who finished in 83^rd place with a time of 31:24.1.