Hogs 26th, hopes dashed

— Arkansas’ season-long quest to regain respectability in cross country ended with a dud.

The Razorbacks, ranked 19th heading into the race, finished 26th in the NCAA Championships with 535 points Monday at Indiana State. Oklahoma State won the men’s 10K race with 127 points, and Villanova won the women’s 6K race with 86 points.

Last year the Razorbacks had program-worst finishes in both place (28th) and points (579). Arkansas finished second in the SEC and won the South Central Region this year, and Coach Chris Bucknam had high hopes for this year’s national meet.

The Razorbacks improved but only marginally despite junior Dorian Ulrey’s fourth place finish among team runners. Freshman Solomon Haile chipped in a 41st-place finish, but Arkansas’ third through fifth runners could only manage 162nd, 163rd and 165th.

“I must not have had them as ready as I thought,” Bucknam said. “It wasn’t as big a step as I would have like to have taken. We took a good step at the SEC, we took a good step at regionals. It just wasn’t a very big step at this meet.”

Ulrey, running in his first cross country national, ran well in the lead pack behind Liberty’s Samuel Chelanga.Chelanga won the race in 28 minutes, 41.3 seconds after breaking away early.

Ulrey, who was the sixth runner to finish, ran 29:37.9.

Bucknam said he thought Arkansas was capable of a top-20 finish but the 10-day turnaround from the regional race was too quick for some of his lesser-talented runners. Bucknam said senior Rio Reina, junior Lane Boyer and sophomore Rick Elliott all ran at least one minute slower than their times at Chile Pepper in October.

“It wasn’t meant to be for those guys,” Bucknam said. “Historically speaking, 26th place isn’t much to write home about. It’s a process to get back to the upper echelon of times. It’s not going to happen overnight.”

The women Razorbacks didn’t compete as a team but had two runners compete individually. Junior Miranda Walker finished 124th overall in 21:27.8, and freshman Alyssa Allison finished 195th in 22:02.8.

Virginia junior Catherine White, whose preseason transfer gutted Arkansas of its top runner, finished fourth overall in 19:59.5. Angela Bizzarri of Illinois won the individual title in 19:46.8.

Sports, Pages 19 on 11/24/2009