Three-Peat: Cross Country Cruises to Third Straight CCC Title
Leopards score a program-best 37 points at the conference championship as Alex Robbins, Dan McSolla, and Josh Gangemi earn All-CCC honors as part of the third straight title; Robbins named senior scholar-athlete of the year while head coach Dan Roark repeats as conference coach of the year
BIDDEFORD, Maine – For the third consecutive season the Wentworth Institute of Technology cross country team has brought home a championship trophy as the Leopards bested the field at the 2017 Commonwealth Coast Conference Championship, held at Rotary Park.
Wentworth's five scoring runners all placed in among the top 15 runners to give the Black & Gold an impressive 37 points, which was 34 points better than second-place Endicott, and its lowest team score at the CCC Championship in the four-year varsity history of the program.
Senior Alex Robbins (Mansfield, Mass.) picked up his fourth straight All-CCC nod with a second-place finish (26:39.2). Robbins was also honored with the conference's senior scholar-athlete of the year award as the computer science major with a cumulative grade point average of just over a 3.91 has combined athletics and academics during his successful career.
No stranger to all-conference accolades, senior Dan McSolla (Bridgewater, Mass.) picked up his fourth straight All-CCC honor as he finished in third place with a time of 27:18.2. Junior Josh Gangemi (Norton, Mass.) earned all-conference honors for the first time in his career, placing seventh with a time of 28:01.5. Senior Patrick Hopkins (Lansdale, Pa.) narrowly missed his fourth all-conference honor, finishing 11th with a time of 28:25.9. Freshman Tyler Cosma (Center Moriches, N.Y.) finished 14th with a time of 28:37.4 while sophomore Tom Caruso (Mahopac, N.Y.) was 15th (28:51.5) to round out Wentworth's scoring runners.
Freshman Anthony Maida (Peabody, Mass.) crossed the line in a time of 29:46.7 to finish 29th, junior Nathan Ouellette (Wells, Maine) was right behind him to finish 30th (29:47.6), freshman Davio DeLuca (Nottingham, N.H.) was 34th with a time of 29:55.1, freshman Rob Moran (Billerica, Mass.) was 36th (30:03.6), freshman Will Allen (West Hartford, Conn.) placed 43rd with a time of 30:24.1, freshman Wes Brimeyer (Dubuque, Iowa), senior Zach Howey (Sherwood, Ark.) was 62nd (31:31.5), and junior Chris Kaberle (Pelham, N.H.) placed 65th in the 100-runner field with a time of 31:38.3
Second-year head coach Dan Roark picked up CCC Coach of the Year honors for a second consecutive season.
This year's senior class, which entered the school for the inaugural varsity season of cross country, finished in second place as freshman and have won three straight CCC titles for an impressive four-year run. The Leopards will attempt to qualify for the NCAA Division III Championships on November 11 when they will run at the NCAA regionals in Gorham, Maine.
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