Texas A&M senior Henry Lelei received the men’s Runner of the Week accolades from the SEC conference office this week after he opened his cross country season with a victory at the Rice Invitational this past Friday.
An All-American in cross country after placing ninth in the NCAA Championships a year ago, Lelei clocked a winning time of 16 minutes, 25 seconds, to win by 23 seconds over a 6,000-meter course on the Rice campus.
The effort from Lelei led the Aggies to a team victory as A&M scored 37 points and bettered a field of 13 teams, which included seven ranked squads from the South Central region. Rice and Lamar tied for second place with 85 points each.
SEC women’s Runner of the Week honor went to Katie Breathitt of Ole Miss while the freshman honors were awarded to Tennessee’s Kyle Walter and Florida’s Julie Macedo.
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The Aggie men remain the top rated SEC team among the national rankings. This week’s USTFCCCA poll has Texas A&M ranked No. 15, down one spot from last week. The Aggie men remain ranked No. 2 in the South Central region while the A&M women are still No. 3 in the region poll.
Other schools from the SEC in the national men’s rankings include Arkansas at No. 22 and Georgia at No. 30. Also receiving votes is Florida.
Wisconsin men remain No. 1 followed by Oklahoma State, BYU, Oklahoma, Portland, Colorado, Texas, Iona, Stanford and Florida State in the top 10. The next five schools include NC State, Indiana, Syracuse, Princeton and the Aggies.
In the other half of the men’s top 30 are Georgetown, Minnesota, Northern Arizona, Tulsa, Villanova, Michigan, Arkansas, Notre Dame, New Mexico, Oregon, Eastern Kentucky, UCLA, Washington State, Columbia and Georgia.
Among the SEC women’s teams Vanderbilt is the top rated conference team at No. 7 with Arkansas at No. 9 with Florida ranked No. 28.
