Hokie ClubBLACKSBURG – The Virginia Tech men’s cross country won the program’s first ACC cross country title behind redshirt senior Will Mulherin’s individual championship, the first in program history. Tech finished with three runners in the top seven to win the race with 55 points, six clear of second-place Virginia.
“This is just a most improbable victory for us,” Virginia Tech head coach Ben Thomas said. “On paper there are certainly more talented teams, but today we just found a way. All of the guys fought hard today, this is like a dream being the first Virginia Tech team to win an ACC cross country title.
“We had to have a lot fall into place today. We thought we needed four guys to make All-ACC and we ended up with three, it was just a great team effort. I'm so proud of Will Mulherin, he ran a great race.”
Mulherin led the field with a course record time of 23.37.3. It was the top time of the season for him and his first individual win of the year.
“This is just amazing. I wanted to do this for the past three years. Today I wanted to go out with the leaders early and then run the last K as hard as I could. Last year I started too slow and finished seventh. I was determined not to do that again.”
Also, finishing in the top 10 were sophomores Brayden Burleigh and Thomas Curtin. Burleigh, a late addition to today’s group, took sixth with a time of 23:54.7. Curtin finished just behind Burleigh in seventh coming in at 23:56.3.
Mulherin, Burleigh and Curtin each earned All-ACC honors by finishing in the top 14. All three Hokies also topped their previous best finishes of the season while Burleigh and Curtin both finished with times under 24 minutes for the first time in their careers.
Redshirt senior Michael Hammond, Tech’s fourth finisher came in at 19th with a time of 24:27.5. He was followed by Leoule Degfae who took 22nd with a time of 24:32.0.
On the women’s side the Hokies finished in 10th place with 260 points. Junior Alex Watt was Tech’s highest finisher coming in at 21:48.3 in 40th place. Rounding out the Hokies’ top five were sophomore Sarah Rapp (51st), freshman Hannah Gray (53rd), freshman Lauren Jaeger (55th) and freshman Katherine Sheridan (83rd).