LOGAN, Utah - The Northern Arizona University men's cross country team won the Mountain Regional Championships for the second-consecutive season Friday at the Reeder Cross Country Course, punching their ticket to defend their title at the NCAA National Championships on Nov. 18. The women's team ran a hard race as well, climbing from the back of the pack to battle back to come in eighth, its highest finish since 2015.

On the men's side, Tyler Day led the way placing third with a time of 30:16.5 for the 10K course. Matt Baxter was right behind in fifth with a 30:18.3 performance. Peter Lomong came in 11th (30:38.6), Geordie Beamish (30:40.8) came in 12th and Andrew Trouard came in 18th (30:45.9) to round out the NAU scoring attack.

"It's a unique couple weeks in the scheduling and format in NCAA cross country," Director of Cross Country Michael Smith said. "This meet is always about trying to advance unscathed, however, we have to always treat it like a race. It's an opportunity for us to go through our process and we talked about the pieces that were important for us in this meet that will translate well to the national meet; accountability to each other, managing emotions through chaos and competing and I think we did those things really well. We think we're the best team in the country so we went to the front of today's race and ran like that."

Cory Glines and Harvey Nelson also competed, with Glines coming in 23rd (30:54.6) and Nelson finishing in 82nd (32:38.1).

As a unit, the Lumberjack men had six runners finish before any other team has four of their own athletes come through the finish line.

The guys also placed six runners on the All-Region team with Day, Baxter, Lomong, Beamish, Trouard and Lomong earning the honor.

It is the tenth straight meet victory for the NAU men dating back to last season.

The team won the event with 49 points, nudging the No. 2 team in the nation BYU by 30 points. Colorado (80 points), Colorado State (103) and Air Force made up the meet's top five.

On the women's side, Paige Gilchrist ran another strong race in what has been an outstanding senior season, finishing in eighth with a 20:21.8 showing for the 6K course.

"We've ask this group to come a long way in a short period of time," Smith said. "A lot of the teams that make the national meet are teams that are there year after year, and we're coming from a long way back trying to be one of those teams and we got really, really close."

Mikayla Malaspina came in 18th (20:38.4) while Miranda Myers finished in 39th (21:08.9).

Delaney Rasmussen crossed the line in 78th (21:46.9), Emily Roughan finished 88th (21:53.9), Kylie Goo came in 96th (22:03.2) and Pipi Eitel rounded things out in 115th (22:36.7).

The women also placed two runners on the All-Region team in Gilchrist and Malaspina.

"This season was a still a huge success," Smith added. "It's a totally different group from a year ago, and their mindset of what's possible is totally different, the culture is different. Their take on training and the day-to-day is different. The belief in themselves and each other is different. That's the stuff that you don't always see in the results, but we know that, we're around them everyday and over time that is going to lead to even better performances. Now we're a team that can seriously talk about making the NCAA meet when a year ago, we couldn't seriously take a crack at it. And that's what we did today, we took a crack at it."

While the women will not get a chance to compete at NCAAs as a team, Gilchrist secured a berth and Malaspina might be joining her in Louisville as individuals. Malaspina will have to wait until the NCAA Selection Show on Saturday at 1:00 p.m. MST to learn her fate.

"Competing at the NCAA meet is a huge honor and I'm really happy for both of them," Smith said. "Paige had to go through a lot of adversity in her years at NAU with injuries. I talked with her after the race about where she was from a year ago, and she's in a complete different place.  She's a great example for all of us on how you don't give up on a dream, even if it looks not very likely or possible. I'm so happy our younger athletes get to see a veteran like that perform that way. She's going to run really well at the NCAA meet, she's ready to go."

"For Mikayla, I think she really optimizes how far our group has come in a year" Smith added. "She's competing up there with some of the best girls in the country and our region. Whether she makes it or not, we still don't know, but she's right on the bubble to be in that group with some of the best distance runners in America. I'm very happy with her progress."

The Northern Arizona men, Gilchrist and possibly Malaspina will next be in action at the NCAA National Championships on Saturday, Nov. 18 in Louisville, Ky.