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TERRE HAUTE, Ind. - Sophomore Patrick Tiernan (Toowoomba, Australia) paced the Wildcats to a 7th place team finish and placed 18th individually at the NCAA Championships held on Saturday afternoon in Terre Haute, Ind. at the LaVern Gibson Championship Course. It marked the first top-10 team finish for the Wildcats dating back to the 2001 season and marked their best finish since 2000 when the team placed 6th overall.

Tiernan finished in the top 20 individually in the championship race for the second-straight year and capped another outstanding season for the Aussie-born harrier. The sophomore claimed three individual races this season at the Main Line Invitational, Washington Invitational and BIG EAST Championship leading up to today's race.

"Marcus told me to stay conservative and I thought I was doing that by hanging with the lead pack and not making any sort of moves," said Tiernan. "I thought it was pretty slow and at the 7k mark I just wasn't feeling good. But that's alright, you live and you learn."

Villanova had a team score of 206 points that included the scoring runners of senior Rob Denault (Aurora, Ont.), senior Sam McEntee (Perth, Australia), junior Jordy Williamsz (Melbourne, Australia) and senior Brian Basili (South Orange, N.J.) in addition to Tiernan.

Head coach Marcus O'Sullivan stated, "We were so close to getting on the podium and to be that close and to see how the race panned out - it really was a race where the first half they walked and the second half was a sprint. I think we missed the break and with all that said and done it was disappointing." He continued, "In many ways I think the team as a whole collectively had a terrific season. All said and done it was a great season."

The race went out slow on the soft and muddy course after an ample amount of snow fell earlier this week on the LaVern Gibson Championship Course. Nearly 90 runners made up the lead pack through 3000 meters following an unusually slow pace to start the race. The pack was still 80-strong through the 5k mark before finally stretching out with just 2000 meters to run. Tiernan followed with nine other runners to break away from the field before the final surge to the finish.

Following Tiernan's lead was the three-man finish of Denault in 56th place (31:10), McEntee in 57th place (31:10) and Williamasz in 58th place (31:10.9). The trio proved to be a strong group all season long and once again lived up to their reputation. Basili rounded out the Villanova top-5 in 86th place with a time of 31:27.5.

Also running for the Wildcats were sophomores Harry Warnick (Fairfield, Conn.) and Kevin Corbusier (Monkton, Md.) who finished in 124th and 156th place, respectively.

Villanova concluded a terrific season with today's national championship race. This is the eighth straight year that the Wildcats qualified for the NCAA meet which marks a new program record. Villanova captured the team titles at both the BIG EAST Championships and the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional for the second-straight year with Tiernan also claiming the individual title at the conference meet.

Edward Cheserek, a sophomore from Oregon, won the individual national championship by three seconds over teammate Eric Jenkins. Colorado also repeated as the team champions with 65 points and beat out Stanford (98) and the rest of the 31 team field.

Notes: Today's team finish marks the first top-10 finish since 2001 when the Wildcats were 8th and marks the best finish since 2000 when they were 6th ... Tiernan is the 36th Villanova All-American in cross country and the ninth Wildcat to be at least a 2-time All-American in cross country... This is the 15th time overall in 32 appearances at the NCAA Championships that the Wildcats finished in the top 10 of the team standings ... This was team's record eighth straight NCAA appearance... Villanova was one of nine teams in this year's field of 31 that have made at least eight straight appearances.