CLINTON, Miss.—The Alabama State women's cross country team won its fourth straight SWAC Championship, while the men finished third Monday at the league meet held at Choctaw Trails.
 
The Alabama State women's team made history as six runners placed in the top six spots sweeping the meet with a perfect score of 15.  

The Lady Hornets were led by SWAC Runner of the Year Artrailia Lesane, who finished first overall with a time of 17:49.20. Paige Rankine (18:08.45) placed second, Shantia Wilson (18:36.31) placed third, Tatiana Etienne (18:44.78) fourth, Santina Williams (19:01.03) finished fifth, and Kimberly Wedderburn (19:20:13) placed sixth for Alabama State.

 Brandee Ebert (19:51.97), Sade Lavallias (20:01.14), and Shakailia Williams (20:50.17) helped wrap up the dominating victory for the Lady Hornets.

 The Lady Hornets ran a combined time of 1:32:19.78, averaging 18:27.96 per runner.

"I am very excited for our ladies and their performance," said head coach Ritchie Beene, who again won SWAC Women's Head Coach of the Year honors. "Today was an impressive day; our ladies finished 1-6 which in my career has never happened. We as a team dedicated this race to breast cancer and sexual abuse/violence awareness towards women in America and I am pleased with the results. We plan to enjoy this moment and then prepare to move on to the next phase of the season.

Lesane, Rankin, Wilson, Etienne, and Williams all received First-Team All-SWAC honors and Wedderburn was named to the Second-Team.With the win, the Lady Hornets have now qualified for the NCAA South Region.  The regional championship will be held in Tallahassee, Fla. on Nov.14th.

 Behind Alabama State, were Prairie View ( 96 pts.), Texas Southern (113 pts.), Alcorn State (132 pts.), Grambling (139 pts.), Mississippi Valley (164 pts.), Southern (176 pts.), Alabama A&M (185 pts.), Jackson State (197 pts.) and Arkansas-Pine Bluff (239 pts.).

The men came into the championship looking to get over the hump of their second-place finish from last season.  They ran strong but, they fell slightly short of their goal finishing third overall.
The Hornets Andrew Coicou (27:35.64) led the way with a season's best time finishing 10th, Gregory Thigpen followed finishing 13th overall crossing the line in 27:51.59. Tyree Newton (27:59.04) and Bryont Brown (28:03.91) finished 15th and 16th overall.  

Coicou received Second-Team All-SWAC honors for his top ten finish. Other finishers for the men were Teven Avant (29:09.87), Carlos Flores (30:55.55), Shemar Rannie (30:55.99) and Christian Jones (34:20.26).

 The Hornets ran a combined time of 2:20:40.05 averaging 28:08.01 per runner.

 "I am very proud of our men's program," Beene said. "We knew coming into the championship we had the talent to finish in the top three and a shot at winning it. We will go back to the drawing board with this men's team, get back to recruiting, and fill in the gaps that we missed out on today."
 Alabama State needed only 47 points to catch overall winner Prairie View which won the men's event with 37 points to ASU's 84.Texas Southern (48 pts.) was second. and Jackson State (98 pts.) was fourth. Fifth-place finish was Mississippi Valley (146 pts.), Grambling (157 pts.), Alcorn State (161 pts.), Arkansas Pine-Bluff (167 pts.) and Southern (259 pts.)
                                                                                  
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