HARDEEVILLE, S.C. – No. 4 Embry-Riddle men's cross-country concluded its regular season with a second place finish at the Sand Shark Invitational on Saturday morning.  The event was hosted the University of South Carolina Beaufort and featured 37 teams from both the NAIA and NCAA II levels.
 
With 102 points, the Eagles finished behind only No. 8 Tennessee Wesleyan, which totaled 86 points.
 
The Blue and Gold were without one of their top runners, Paul McKenna, but still managed to produce three of the meet's top 25 finishers.  Senior Alec Hernandez was the team's top individual finisher coming in second place, his fourth top five finish this season, with a personal best time of 24:32.82.  Vincent Bett (25:57.36) and Keneth J. Pineiro-Collazo (25:15.30) finished 14^th and 24^th respectively, while Andrew Carpenter (25:20.63) and Matt Graves (25:37.20) rounded out the Eagles scorers placing 26^th and 36^th respectively. 
 
In addition to Hernandez, a handful of other Eagle harriers also set career best times on Saturday including Pineiro-Collazo and Graves, as well as Ryan Larson (25:42.06), Adam Lawrence (26:22.20), and James Fell (27:05.53).
 
Andrew Carosi (27:38.65), Dalton L'Heureux (29:06.75), and Paul Meesala (29:37.52) added to the impressive day for the Eagles as they each posted their best times of the season.
 
Eight men's cross country teams from the Sun Conference participated in Saturday's Sand Shark Invitational.  Embry-Riddle defeated each of them handedly with its second place team finish, as the next closest Sun Conference finisher was SCAD Savannah, which placed eighth overall with 210 points.
 
The Eagles will race against all of their league opponents in two weeks (Nov. 8) when they head to West Palm Beach, Fla. for The Sun Conference Championships.