AZUSA, Calif. --- A 10,000-meter run and over 31-minutes of racing came down to the slimmest of margins on Friday night, with that slim margin making Ryan Thompson a PacWest Champion! Thompson beat the second-place runner in the 10k by eight-hundredths of a second to claim the second individual conference title for Biola in its two-year PacWest history.

Thompson finished in 31:39.02 with Angel Aguirre of Concordia Irvine crossing the line in 31:39.10. It was one of many memorable efforts turned in by Biola student-athletes on day one at the conference meet.

Most events ran just their prelim competition on Friday, but some distance events and field events featured finals, resulting in 35 points for the Biola women and 33 points for the men. The teams sit in third and fourth respectively through the first half of competition.

In addition to Thompson, Biola had two other All-PacWest performances, saw a new school record set and had 17 performances good enough to punch a ticket to finals in events on Saturday.

Nathaniel Belden is the Eagle who set the school record. The junior had another busy day, competing in the 110m hurdles, 100m, javelin toss and the long jump. He scored points for BU in the javelin, finished one spot shy of making finals in the 100m and broke his own school record in the hurdles event. Belden had the top time from any male hurdler in the prelims to set the new school mark at :14.80.

The two All-PacWest finishes came on the women's side in a pair of distance events. First Clara Haynes logged a massive season-best in the 3,000m steeplechase to finish second overall with a time of 11:06.33. Her previous top time in the event was 11:29.48. Mandy Reyes also managed a top-5 finish, coming in fifth with her go of 11:29.65.

Next up Micaela Pulliam earned all-conference with her third-place finish in the 10k (37:35.83). The 10,000m run equated to a lot of points for the BU ladies as Pulliam led a group that finished third, fourth and fifth overall. Right behind her were Mackenna Mason (37:37.94) and Kaili Waller (37:50.30). It was a new PR for both Mason and Waller. Waller saw a very significant drop from her previous best of 41:02.76.

New bests were coming from all over on Friday, including on the field side of things. Sarah Prystupa had an excellent showing in the pole vault, just missing all-conference marks with a fourth-place finish and mark of 3.67m.

Aaron Jackson (6.74m) and Sarah Rossiter (5.39m) both set new collegiate-bests in the long jump with Jackson scoring points with his seventh-place finish. They were both Biola's second finishers in the LJ, with J'Vaughn Singleton leading the guys placing sixth with a 6.77m and Hannah Hubbard coming in sixth on the women's side with a 5.47m.

Aside from the accomplishments above, the following student-athletes managed to finish high enough in prelim runs on Friday to advance to Saturday finals:
Shannon Howell - 1,500m
Clara Haynes - 1,500m
Kaitlyn Natividad - 1,500m
Ryan St. Pierre - 1,500m
Gabe Plendcio - 1,500m
Nic Nelson - 1,500m
Sarah Ann Frank - 100m hurdles - top-3 in prelim
Heidi Sowers - 100m hurdles
Nathaniel Belden - 110m hurdles - top-3 in prelim
Corry Williams - 110m hurdles
J'Vaughn Singleton - 110m hurdles
Mathias Davis - 400m
Noah Styffe - 100m
Shelby Rogers - 800m
Luke Sutherland - 800m - top-3 in prelim
Aditya Lal - 800m
Noah Styffe - 200m

Saturday's competition at the Cougar Athletic Complex is scheduled for a 10 a.m. start time. Catch all the action at http://finishedresults.trackscoreboard.com/#/results/meet/8288