California State Championships

Woodward Park, Fresno

The American River College men's team lived up to its #1 ranking by winning the California Community College Athletic Association men's cross country state title for the 4^th time in 5 years. That also is the 6^th straight top 2 finish at the season ending meet. The Beavers score of 67 points was nearly 50 points ahead of 2^nd place Mt SAC who scored 116. Last year's champion College of the Canyons was 3^rd with 123 points. The point spread was the 2^nd largest margin of victory in school history – behind only the 2011 team that set the Woodward Pak course record. The race started very slowly as no one seemed to want to lead. Before long, several Beavers had moved up within sight of the leaders, including sophomore Abdul Hamid and freshman Donald Plazola. At the finish it was American River placing 3 runners in the top 11 (Abdul Hamid 6^th, Donald Plazola 7^th, and Sophomore Sean Gregg 11^th). Sophomore David French made a monstrous move in the last mile, gaining about 10 places and moving up to 18^th. Freshman Ozzie Hassen, coming off a 3 week injury, faded over the last mile, but held on to finish as the last scorer for ARC, taking 26^th place. Sophomore Brad Needles had one of his best races of the year taking 41^st place and finishing as the 11^th NorCal finisher. Ross Walker was the 7^th finisher for the Beavers, taking 48^th overall – he was also the 13^th NorCal finisher.

Complete results https://www.directathletics.com/results/xc/9255.html