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Nov. 15, 2012

The sixth-ranked University of Oklahoma men’s cross country team and senior Jessica Engel are set to compete at the 2012 NCAA Championships on Saturday, Nov. 17 in Louisville, Ky.

The meet is hosted by the University of Louisville and will be held at the E.P. Tom Sawyer State Park. The women’s race will begin at 11:00 a.m. CT, followed by the men’s race at approximately 12:15 p.m. CT.

For the first time since World War II, The NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships will be held on a Saturday instead of a Monday - and for just the second time in a BIG EAST Conference City. With the new date formula prescribing the national meet be held on Saturday before Thanksgiving, and by virtue of the calendar having the earliest possible Thanksgiving this year, the meet will be the earliest in Division I history.

Thirty-one teams were selected to participate in both the men’s and women’s championship. The top two, seven-person teams automatically qualified from each of the nine regions, for a total of 18 teams last weekend at their respective regional sites. Thirteen additional teams were selected at-large.

Thirty-eight individuals were selected to participate in each championship through an automatic qualifier and at-large selection process. All individual qualifiers finished in the top-25 in their region.

The first-place finisher will be crowned the 2012 NCAA Champion and the first 40 runners to cross the finish line in each race will be named All-Americans.

The men’s team returns to the NCAA Championships for the fourth consecutive year. The Crimson and Cream tied for first with Big 12 foe Oklahoma State in the NCAA Midwest Regional in Springfield, Mo., last week to automatically qualify for the national meet. En route to the tie, six of Oklahoma’s runners earned All-Region honors.

Set to compete for the Sooners at the Championship are Patrick Casey, Bill Kogel, Brandon Doughty, Riley Masters, Ryan Poland, Kevin Williams and Andrew Weaver.

Oklahoma returns experienced runners to the NCAA meet in Kogel and Williams who competed at the 2011 NCAA Championships for OU where the team took sixth overall. The Sooners finished just outside of the top-five by 14 seconds.

Kogel led the Crimson and Cream after he finished 29^th in 29:58 with only three Big 12 runners ahead of him earning his first All-American honor, making him the sixth honoree in the program’s history. Williams placed 53rd with a time of 30:25.

Engel will also return to the NCAA Championships for the second consecutive year after securing an individual spot at the NCAA Midwest Regional meet where she took fourth with a 20:29.89 performance earning All-Region honors.

At the 2011 NCAA Championships, Engel placed 86th with a time of 20:54.

A live webcast of the championships will be broadcast on NCAA.com.