Heartland men's cross country wrapped-up its final tune-up before NJCAA DII Nationals on Thursday, as the Hawks traveled to Charleston, Ill. for the Region-24 Meet at Eastern Illinois University. The Hawks placed first over Kaskaskia College and Danville Area Community College in the NJCAA DII division. Vincennes University, a NJCAA DI team, also participated in the race.
 
Matt Padilla paced the Hawks in first place overall with a time of 26:23.70. Overall, Heartland accounted for the top-10 places in the DII race.
 
"Matt and Collin (Delagrange) ran awesome today," Heartland head coach Ty Wolf said. "Our men's team swept the first 10 places in the race. I was hoping we would run together in a pack, but that wasn't the way the race went."
 
Below are the remaining individual results for the Hawks from the Region-24 men's race, which featured 20 total runners on the Division II side.
 
2. Brock Loftus (27:34.80)
3. Ben Huey (27:40.20)
4. Collin Delagrange (27:50.20)
5. Eli Mojonnier (27:52.00)
6. Sam Bushert (27:52.40)
7. Colton Knowles (27:54.90)
8. Elijah House (28:43.90)
9. Kyler McNinch (28:58.50)
10. Sky Riddle (29:15.90)
12. Erik Garcia (30:48.80)
 
The Hawks will now advance to the NJCAA DII National Meet, which will take place at 2:30 pm on Nov. 11 in Huntsville, Ala.
 
"Nationals will be very competitive this year," Wolf said. "Our number one and two runners will have to take care of business up-front. And, our number three, four, five and six runners will have to compete for us to be in trophy contention."