Washington State's Evans Kurui places sixth in 10K at NCAA Championships

EUGENE - Washington State's Evans Kurui placed sixth in the 10,000-meter national final on Wednesday at the NCAA Championships, earning first-team All-America honors for the second consecutive season.

The sophomore from Kenya finished with a time of 28:10.73 at Hayward Field on the University of Oregon campus. He hung with the leading pack for most of the race, and went in front at times during the final three laps, but wound up crossing the finish about 10 seconds behind the podium leaders.

Kurui, who has finished in the top eight in the event in the past two years, became the first Cougar to earn back-to-back first-team All-America honors since Jeshua Anderson repeated as a four-time 400-meter hurdles NCAA champion from 2008-11.

New Mexico's Habtom Samuel won the race with a time of 27:51.31.

Kurui placed third in the 10,000 at the NCAA West regional last month to qualify for nationals, and also finished fifth in the 5,000-meter race at the regional in Fayetteville, Arkansas, to earn a spot in the NCAA Championships field for that event. Kurui will compete in the 5,000-meter final at 6:55 p.m. Friday.

Earlier in the day, University of Idaho senior Blake Sturgis placed 14th in the javelin. The Spokane native's throw of 231 feet, 7 inches was the third best in the first flight, but he fell down the leaderboard in the second flight.

A Valley Christian grad, Sturgis entered the championships with the No. 15 javelin toss in the nation at 240-2 - the second-longest javelin throw in UI history, recorded last month at the Whitworth Last Chance Meet in Spokane. Sturgis became the first Vandals javelin thrower to qualify for nationals in over a decade when he placed eighth last month at the NCAA West regional.

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