Williams' XC All-America honor is the 38th in WSU history. TERRE HAUTE, Ind. -- Led by the 30th-place finish by junior Michael Williams, the No. 18 Washington State men's cross country team finished 14th at the NCAA DI Cross Country Championships Saturday afternoon at the LaVern Gibson Championship Cross Country Course at the Wabash Valley Family Sports in Terre Haute, Ind.

This is the highest Cougar finish in 32 years when the WSU men took seventh place at the 1984 championship in University Park, Penn. Williams, from Richland, Wash., earned All-America honors (top 40 individuals) with his 30th-place finish. Prior to Saturday, the most recent WSU runners to earn All-America cross country honors were Bernard Lagat, with a seventh-place finish, and Eric Kamau, with a 29th-place finish, both in 1998 when the WSU men took 18th place.
 

Running a 10,000 meters race for the second time in nine days, Williams ran a time of 30 minutes, 16.6 seconds, 30th overall and 24th in team scoring. Senior John Whelan (Etna, Calif.) finished 63rd overall/49th team scoring in a time of 30:37.6.The remaining Cougar men scoring were: Nathan Tadesse (sophomore, Surrey, B.C. Canada) 113th/90th (30:58.1); Sam Levora (junior, Sandpoint, Idaho) 115th/91st (30:58.6); and Chandler Teigen (sophomore, Anatone, Wash.) 145th/116th (31:12.2). Other Cougars racing were Paul Ryan (sophomore, Moscow, Idaho), who finished 220th in a time of 31:57.4, and Nathan Wadhwani (sophomore, Maple Ridge, B.C. Canada), who was spiked early in the race and was not able to continue running.
 
"I felt great out there," Williams said. "I got off to a slow start but just kept strong and moving up during the race."
 
"Being a part of the best team finish in over 30 years was a great way to end my Cougar cross country career," two-year team captain and lone senior Whelan said. "I'm really proud of this group and I know we have a lot of momentum moving forward. One of the overall goals of mine for a long time has been to leave this program in a place where we're on a trajectory to become a national powerhouse again, and I can see that progress happening."
 
No. 1 Northern Arizona won the men's team title with 125 points followed by No. 3 Stanford with 158 points and No. 5 Syracuse with 164. Pac-12 Conference men's team finishes were: 6. No. 2 Colorado (223); 9. No. 13 Oregon (282); 14. No. 18 Washington State (370); 15. No. 10 UCLA (378); and 31. No. 26 California (776). Villanova senior, Patrick Tiernan, won the men's individual title with a time of 29:22.0. Three-time NCAA champion Edward Cheserek from Oregon finished third (29:48.0).
 
"The team was awesome today! They executed the race plan very well. They were very controlled through the first part of the race and then finished strong," WSU Director of Cross Country/Track & Field Wayne Phipps said. "Michael Williams had an awesome race to finish as an All-American. He ran a very intelligent race and moved up extremely well in the last half of the race."
 
No. 12 Oregon won the women's team title with 125 points narrowly edging No. 5 Michigan with 126. Other Pac-12 member finishes were: 3. No. 1 Colorado (134), 5. No. 4 Stanford (255), 12. No. 7 Washington (352), 20. No. 27 Utah (493), and 28. No. 30 UCLA (596). Karissa Schweizer, a junior from the University of Missouri, was the women's individual champion running the 6000m course in 19:41.6.