Nov. 19, 2007
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. – University of New Mexico senior Jeremy Johnson put a fitting cap on his remarkable 2007 season by finishing 20th to earn All-America honors this morning in his NCAA Cross Country Championship debut. The Albuquerque Manzano product covered the 10,000-meters (6.2 miles) at the LaVern Gibson Championship Course in 30:18.3 en route to the fourth-highest finish in program history.
Liberty senior Josh McDougal out-kicked Oregon junior Galen Rupp down the final 100 meters to win the individual title with a time of 29:22.4
Johnson became New Mexico’s seventh men’s All-American and earned the fourth All-America certificates for the program since 2001 when Santa Fe native Matt Gonzales ended a 19-year drought for the UNM men.
Johnson ran near the front of the pack for the first half of the race, but drifted back into a 12-man group that crossed the 8K mark approximately 25 seconds behind the leaders. He held off a late charge by several runners, however, to become the fourth Lobo ever to finish in the top-20 at the national cross country meet.
“I felt good for the first 5K, but one of my mistakes was I should have just stayed with the first group because it was grinding from there on out,” Johnson said.
Though he felt a higher finish was certainly within his reach, Johnson said he was pleased with what he was able to accomplish in his final collegiate race.
“It wasn’t a bad day or a disaster by any means,” he said. “One of my goals since I came to college was to become All-American in cross country, so I can definitely cross that off my list.”
First-year UNM head coach Joe Franklin said Johnson’s inexperience at the NCAA meet may have hampered him a bit, especially without the support of a team. Johnson was sixth among the 28 individual qualifiers in the race.
“It’s difficult when you don’t have your team there,” Franklin said. “When you toe the line and you are the only one there it is really tough, but he did great and we’re proud of him.”
Johnson, who is petitioning the NCAA for an extra season of eligibility for the 2008 outdoor track season, enjoyed one of the best individual seasons in Lobo cross country history in 2007.
He finished no lower than sixth in his four races leading up the NCAA Championships and ran away with the Mountain West Conference individual title in his final cross country race in Albuquerque. Johnson was also named MWC Cross Country Athlete of the Week twice during the season after breaking his own 8K school record at Oregon and the Pre-Nationals Invitational in Terre Haute.
He advanced to the NCAA Championships for the first time after finishing third – the second-highest in program history – at the NCAA Mountain Region Championships.
“The season for Jeremy was great,” Franklin said. “It’s interesting when you are in the sport of cross county because there are 250-some guys that aren’t happy because there is only one winner, but Jeremy has done an awesome job.”