Sprinting Across the Finish Line: Pitt Greensburg Cross-Country Team to Finish Season at NCAA Regionals

After an incredible season, Pitt-Greensburg Cross-Country is set to wrap up officially after the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Regionals on Saturday, Nov. 11 in Lock Haven. Following the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC) Championships, runners Ethan Barrick, Dylan Ackerman, and Peyton Hause will go on to Regionals.

Barrick, who earned All-AMCC Honors for placing seventh in the AMCC, was one of six runners on the men’s team this year. Although Barrick began his athletic history in wrestling and track, he transitioned to Cross-Country in high school.

“I’m usually on the underdog team,” Barrick says. “It’s always exciting to come out of nowhere. Here, we placed high for not having a lot of people.”

In his second season on the Pitt-Greensburg Cross-Country team, Barrick treats long-distance running as therapeutic.

“When you run something that far, your mind and body kind of become one, so you can keep running even if your body is spent.” Barrick says.

Barrick isn’t the only athlete on the cross-country teams this year to come from a diverse athletic background. Abby Copeland, a third-year Biology major, was first recruited to Pitt-Greensburg to play volleyball. This was her first season on the women’s Cross-Country team.

“The first few races were extremely scary,” Copeland says. “To stand in a box and hear the gun go off was intimidating. But having Hannah there by my side, pushing my pace and pushing me, was an extreme comfort to me.”

Copeland refers to Hannah Lafferty, senior, who was the second of two women to finish out the season. Copeland attributes much racing motivation to a sense of mutual hype with Lafferty.

“Our energies feed off of each other…We get in the zone together and say, ‘full send.’” Copeland says. “I tell her all the time, ‘I don’t know how I would’ve gotten through the season without you.’”

Despite injuries and small numbers, both the men’s and women’s teams achieved personal-and-record-bests over the season. Peyton Hause, a third-year Secondary Education major with an English Writing focus, found pride in running his season-best time at the AMCC conference–and his second-best time ever.

“I was a tenth of a second off of PR-ing,” Hause says.

Hause ran previously under coach Patric Comer at Westmoreland County Community College (WCCC) and attributes much of his success to his previous and current coaches, including Pitt-Greensburg Head Coach Jeremy Eshleman.

“Coach Jeremy is a great coach, and I’m excited to keep running for him,” Hause says. “And I want to give Coach Patrick Comer my praise. Both he and Coach Jeremy are alike, in that their runners come first. They’re both awesome.”

This fall marked Eshleman’s first season coaching at Pitt-Greensburg. Eshleman, a Pitt-Greensburg Alum, ran cross-country in high school and college.

“It’s been a learning experience, but it’s a lot of fun getting back into cross-country,” Eshleman says.

Alongside coaching, Eshleman hopes to promote the team around campus, and has started by creating an Instagram account so that students can follow along with season progress.

“Going into the future, we want to grow the team and find more runners– to find the numbers to fill out the team,” Eshleman says. “That’s our biggest challenge so far.”

At smaller schools like Pitt Greensburg, teamwork becomes indispensable, and the Pitt Greensburg Cross-Country teams exemplify this across the board. So, in preparation for Regionals, Hause looks to his fellow runners.

“Being able to run alongside Ethan and Dylan and the other guys this year…I don’t think we could’ve gotten as far without the whole team,” Hause says. “Racing alongside those guys…I’m excited to see what we can cook up at regionals.”