In the last couple hundred meters of the race, Jacksonville State sophomore George Kiplagat surged and passed up Eastern sophomore Derek Ericson. But Ericson kicked and fought back, passing Kiplagat just before the finish line for eighth place overall, and coming in first for the Panthers.

“A lot of times when people kick past you in that last hundred or so it is really easy to throw the towel in and give up,” Eastern head coach Geoff Masanet said. “But Derek didn’t, he dug deep and overtook that kid and that took a lot of guts.”

While Ericson finished eighth, the Eastern men finished fourth overall at the Ohio Valley Conference Championship meet in Cape Girardeau, Mo.

Eastern Kentucky took first place overall in both the men and women’s races.

Masanet said Ericson took his running to a whole new level and was competing with some pretty high-caliber runners.

“The guys he was running with, the guys he beat, and the guys he almost beat, were all really great guys,” Masanet said. “We are really proud of how Derek did.”

Ericson finished the 8,000-meter race with a time of 26 minutes, 9.9 seconds earning a second-team all conference award.

The Panthers were running without their front runner, senior Brad Butler, because of a foot injury and junior Aaron Iaun said he thought Ericson did a great job stepping up in Butler’s place.

“Obviously, it was a pretty big hit with Butler being out,” Iaun said. “He is hands down, our best guy but Ericson knew there were some big shoes to fill and he did a pretty great job.”

Junior Mario Castrejon was second across the finish line for the Panthers.

The Panther women placed fifth overall with junior Erin O’Grady placing first for Eastern, coming in 18th place with a time of 19:50.2.

Eastern’s top four runners all finished within 13 seconds of each other in the women’s 5,000-meter race.

“The girls stuck together and ran controlled,” Masanet said. “That 13-second gap is great, we wish the pack could have been up a little further, but it was a good strong pack.”

O’Grady said although they knew what to expect, the hills on SEMO’s course were still a challenge for the team.

“The whole race was up and down, up and down, constantly,” O’Grady said. “It was really tough to get yourself into and maintain any kind of rhythm because you were constantly trying to recollect yourself after every hill.”

“EKU was unbelievably good, like we expected, they went out really quick and pulled the rest of us along,” junior Eric Pedersen said.

Brandy Provaznik can be reached at 581-7944 or at blprovaznik@eiu.edu.