Pirate men dominate OEC Cross Country Championships!
ORANGE -- It was as good of a performance as anyone could ask for as the Orange Coast College men's cross country team finished 1-2-3-4-5 for a perfect team score of 15 points on Friday at the Orange Empire Conference Championships, held at Irvine Park.
Winners of nine of the past 12 OEC titles, the Pirates dominated Friday's event as defending champion Riverside City College came in a distant second place with 62 points, while Saddleback College (91) finished third.
Only five runners cracked the 21-minute mark on the 4-mile course and they were all Pirates! Luis Morales took home the conference title with a winning time of 20 minutes, 36.15 seconds, edging out teammate Brandon Ferguson's time of 20:37.73. Close behind them were the trio of Jose Ortiz (20:46.38), Lucio Ramirez (20:53.41) and Jay Bonthius (20:55.5).
Saddleback's Ricardo Medina broke the string of OCC runners by finishing sixth with a time of 21:12.14, edging out Coast's sixth runner, Conner Garcia (21:12.38).
Here's how dominant the Pirates were on Friday -- following OCC's 1-2-3-4-5 runners, Coast's next five runners finished 7-10-11-13-15. Those 56 points would have also won the OEC title had the first five runners not shown up.
Following Garcia was the OCC foursome of Cesar Galvez (10th, 21:48.72), Dillon Scott (11th, 21:49.05), Christopher Harlan (13th, 21:25.93) and Jesus Valdez (21:54.38).
Other top times for the Pirates included Jorge Jeronimo (22:09.21), Michael Martinez (22:26.45), Ryan Ogan (22:58.43), Omar Cisneros (23:29.62), Eddie Robles (23:35.94), Mathew Sommer (23:46.51), Joel Kuehn (24:50.14), Ryan Leonard (28:04.2) and David Lopez (31:00.93).
The Pirates will now prepare for the Southern California Regional Meet, set for Saturday, Nov. 9 at Central Park in Santa Clarita, beginning at 10 a.m.
