In the second year of the program, the Bellevue University men's cross country team continued to improve upon their debut season with faster times, higher individual placings, and better team finishes.
The season began at the Bill Buxton Invite in Indianola, Iowa with Chris Casart leading the men to a third-place finish among seven scoring teams. Casart finished 13th and was supported by a solid debut from freshman Edrei Murillo, who finished in 19th place.
At the Bronco Invite in Hastings, Casart was 14th and the men finished in seventh of ten teams, just one point out of the sixth spot.
The team returned to Iowa for the Graceland Invite where they were unfortunately shorthanded and unable to fill a full team. Individually, three top-ten finishes highlighted the day with Casart in third, Cole Wagner in seventh, and Gerardo Najera in ninth.
The Wildcat Invite at Wayne produced the first individual award winner for the Bruins as Casart cracked the top ten running 27:34. Murillo ran a strong race, reducing his personal best to 28:04. The men were right behind host Wayne for the third spot among six teams in the NCAA II-dominated meet.
The Bruin men shone at the Briar Cliff Invite at the Adams Nature Preserve in North Sioux City with four personal bests on the day. Casart just narrowly missed becoming the first Bruin man to break the 27-minute barrier with a 27:02, good for 36th place. Wagner began rounding into shape with his 27:31 and Aaron Newton went under 29 minutes for the first time in his career, running 28:48. The final Bruin personal best belonged to Salah Hilowle running 31:04. The men, now with just the minimum five runners, were 11th of 14 teams.
Back in South Dakota a week later, the Bruins were led by two podium finishers in Casart in 17th and Wagner right behind in 19th. As a team, the men were sixth of nine full teams.
Finally, run under tough conditions in Forest City, Iowa, that included snow on the course, high winds, and frigid temperatures, the Bruin men improved one place from the previous year's NSAA Conference championship with a fourth-place showing. Casart and Wagner were both named all-Conference by virtue of their eighth and ninth-place finishes. Unfortunately, they finished as the fifth and sixth runners who were not members of the championship team, as the top four runners punch individual tickets to the NAIA National Championships. This was Wagner's second consecutive season where he finished as the first non-qualifier.
The Bruins will have to wait until 2020 to get their first national championship qualifier among the men but improvements continue to happen toward that end. Casart and Wagner now hold the No. 1 and No. 2 positions on the all-time 8K time chart and are both poised to join the sub-27 minute club. As a team, the Bruins defeated 36 percent of the teams they faced in 2019, up from 15 percent the previous season.
Coach Christians on the 2019 Season:
"I'm happy with the improvements we made in 2019. It doesn't happen overnight in this sport. It takes time and patience, and more importantly consistency and dedication on the part of the individual runners and this happens mostly when nobody else is around to see it. This group brings the right attitude and will go out and do the work. I am proud of what they've accomplished so far and I'm confident that 2020 is going to be an even better year for us."
