By Steve Holt, Opinion Editor
ACU men’s cross country teams have accumulated quite a long list of accomplishments and boasted more than a few outstanding athletes through the years.
Seventeen Lone Star Conference team titles since 1980.
Five South Central Region titles since 1983.
Twenty-seven all-America selections since 1986.
But the “holy grail” of cross country has always eluded Wildcat teams in the past-an NCAA Division II National Championship. The team arrived in Ashland, Ohio, Thursday with its best chance ever to achieve just that.
But don’t expect Saturday’s race to be a Wildcat blowout-the team will face Western State (Colo.), which will be seeking its fourth consecutive title. Other teams, barring disappointing days by Western or ACU, will likely be running for third place because of the expected Wildcat and Mountaineer dominance.
“I know it’s going to be really close,” head coach Jon Murray said. “I would almost predict that if our team runs really well and their team runs really well, out of the top 25 people, 14 of them will be from our two teams. It’s just a matter of who eeks it out right at the very end.”
ACU brings its best cross country squad ever, led by 2000 national champion Alfred Rugema, who would like to add a team title to his rŽsumŽ before graduating in Decem-ber.
Rugema’s teammates aren’t too shabby either-in fact, the top three Wildcat runners could finish in any order. Junior John Kemboi has a mile-long list of cross country honors and accomplishments in his three years at ACU, and has run alongside Rugema consistently this season. Bernard Manira-kiza will look to add to his stellar sophomore season with a top-five finish Saturday.
“We set a goal at the beginning of the season to win,” said Kemboi, who finished 20th at last year’s nationals. “Now the time has come for us to go and do it, and bring back the glory.”
Murray said, however, that the next three runners will make or break ACU’s title hopes.
Juniors Arthemon Sinda-yigaya, Nick Branen, Jean-Marie Ndukimana and freshman Martin O’Kello have comprised the fourth-through-seventh runners for the majority of the season. Ndukimana and Branen earned all-America honors in 2001 for finishing in the top 25.
“How our fourth, fifth and sixth runners do is going to totally determine the race,” Murray said. “I feel very confident with our top three runners and how they’ll perform. They could do as well as three of the top five.”
Senior Angie Waters and junior Justine Nahimana will be representing ACU individually in the women’s race, after finishing in the top 10 at the region meet. Both are running to earn all-America honors, which Nahimana did in 2000 for her 10th place finish. Waters has seen a great improvement this season in cross country, and is making her first appearance at nationals.
“Justine was 10th two years ago, so she definitely can do that,” Murray said. “This is the first time for Angie, so she’s not real sure about what she’s supposed to do. But I’ve talked to her about being in the top 25 and I think that’s a reasonable goal. We’ll see how she reacts to the crowd and the competition.”
He added that though qualifying the team would have been the ideal situation, he is proud of the two.
“It’s better than one,” Murray said. “It’s not quite as good as our team, but the more the merrier.”
If the nation’s best athletes weren’t competition enough for Wildcat runners, a harsher one may show up Saturday-the temperature at race time is expected to be about 40 degrees.
Amid all the excitement, attention and nerves, Murray is careful to acknowledge the goal at hand.
“I’m always a little bit nervous going into nationals,” Mur-ray said. “I think they’re going to go and perform as best as they can on that day, and if they do that we’ll be happy with the performances.”
