KINGSVILLE. MD. – It was both an impressive and historic day for the Binghamton cross country programs at the America East Championships on Saturday morning at Jerusalem Mills Park.

The Bearcat women placed second out of nine teams, which was their highest finish at the meet since they joined the conference in 2001. On the men's side, meanwhile, Binghamton was also second out of nine teams, which was their highest finish since 2014.

"Today was a great day for both teams and for our program," head coach Annette Acuff said. "Both teams ran very tough in their races. We had three all-conference finishers in each race and several other runners had great meets for us. For the women, this was the best team we've had since I have been here and they showed that today and for the men, its's been a long time since we were in the top two. I couldn't be more proud of everyone."

Graduate students Aziza Chigatayeva and Sophia Ryan took second and third respectively in the women's 5,000-meter race with times of 16:48 and 16:50 respectively. For Chigatayeva, it was her fifth straight top-five finish and the top performance of her career. Ryan was taking part in her first America East meet, having transferred from Utah prior to this semester.

Freshman Sydney Leitner was fifth overall in a time of 17:12. She was the top freshman finisher in the meet and was named the America East Most Outstanding Women's Rookie. Leitner is the second Binghamton runner to have earned the award, following Chigatayeva, who was honored in 2018.

Chigatayeva, Ryan and Leitner each earned first-team all-conference honors, which went to places 1-7. Places 8-14 were named second-team all-conference.

Senior Carolyn Burnell was 20th (18:15) and junior Sheridan Talada closed out the Bearcats' scoring with a 38th-place finish (18:53). Burnell continues to be one of the most improved runners on the women's team this season, with her previous-best finish at the America East Meet being 42nd last year.

Kenzie Doyle of UMass Lowell won the individual title with a time of 16:19. She led the River Hawks to the team title with 36 points. Binghamton was second (67) followed by New Hampshire (74) and Albany (79).
There were 82 finishers in the women's race.

Binghamton's previous-best finish at the America East women's cross country meet was fourth – in both 2005 and last year.

Like the women's team, Binghamton also posted three all-conference selections on the men's side. Senior Matthew Cavaliere was sixth overall, covering the 8,000-meter course in a time of 24:18. He was followed by junior Josh Stone in seventh place (24:23) and senior Ryan Guerci in eighth place (24:31).

This marks the second career all-conference honor for both Cavaliere and Guerci. Both of them previously placed 14th at the meet – Guerci in 2019 and Cavaliere in 2020. Stone's previous best finish was 19th last year.

Closing out the scoring for the Bearcats were senior Marty Dolan in 28th place (25:34) and fellow senior Nick DeFelice in 32nd place (25:43). DeFelice's finish was the best in his career at the America East Meet.

UMass Lowell also won the team and individual titles on the men's side. John Riley clocked a first-place time of 23:41.0, followed by teammate Drew Everett in second place (23:41.6). The River Hawks finished with 27 points, compared to 79 points for Binghamton and 109 for New Hampshire.

There were 80 finishers in the men's race.

This marks the eighth time since 2008 that the Bearcat men's team has placed among the top three at the America East Championships. It won the title in 2009 and 2014 and was previously the runner up in both 2010 and 2013.

Up next for Binghamton is the NCAA East Regional Meet on Nov. 11 at Van Cortlandt Park.