Aaron Jones and No. 1 Men’s XC collect wins at NAIA Appalachian Challenge

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (October 21, 2022) – The No. 1 Milligan University men's cross country team collected a first-place finish at the NAIA Appalachian Challenge at Sequoyah Park on Knoxville on Friday morning.

Aaron Jones took the individual meet title and was one of four Buffs who earned top-10 finishes in the 128-man field. Milligan's team score of 33 edged out No. 10 Montreat, who finished second with 36 points. The Buffs and Cavs combined for eight of the 10 top-finishers at the event.

"Two wins over two really good nationally ranked teams, so we'll take that," said head coach Chris Layne. "We did push it a little bit from the gun and I thought once again they handled that well. We're yet to see them race like they've trained, so the hope is once we get them freshened up we'll see that happen as we turn towards the championship part of our season."

Milligan recorded a team total time of 123:25 and owned a one-through-five spread of 1:07.

Jones recorded his sixth individual cross country victory in 14 collegiate races. Jones navigated the 8k course in 24:10 to win the meet title by a second over teammate Will Stockley (24:11). Both marks by Jones and Stockley are the second-fastest collegiate 8k times for each runner.

Bryn Woodall, Arran Kearney and Zimri Kuhn each logged personal best 8k times. Woodall recorded a 24:39 effort to finish sixth. Kearney finished 10th in 25:06 and Kuhn crossed 14th in 25:17.

Jake Crow and Dawson Reed rounded out Milligan's top seven with Crow in 15th (25:18) and Reed in 16th (25:20). Pablo Rivas recorded a PB of 25:33 to finish 22nd and Thomas Johnson took 25th with a PR of 26:01.

"Solid marks from almost the entire men's team and really proud of how Aaron and Will finished today," said head coach Chris Layne. "We knew Montreat were ready to take a big step and in this field that really made it close today."

The Buffs set their sights on the Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) Championships on Nov. 5 in Columbia, S.C.