NEW ORLEANS — Xavier University of Louisiana has received affiliation with the NAIA's Red River Athletic Conference for the 2015 cross country season. As a result, both the Gold Rush and Gold Nuggets will compete for RRAC team and individual titles and for automatic berths to the NAIA National Championships.
NAIA legislation approved in 2014 permits teams in conferences without automatic bids — five or fewer eligible teams — to pursue affiliate membership with automatic-bid conferences. The Gulf Coast Athletic Conference, Xavier's home since 1981, will not qualify for automatic bids to nationals in cross country this year.
Xavier will continue to compete for GCAC championships and bids to nationals in women's volleyball, men's and women's basketball and men's and women's outdoor track and field. Men's and women's tennis will compete in an NAIA unaffiliated group for the sixth consecutive year.
Xavier won each of the last nine GCAC men's and women's cross country team championships and produced six men's and four women's individual champions during that time.
The Red River's full-time cross country members are Huston-Tillotson, Jarvis Christian, Langston, LSU-Shreveport, Our Lady of the Lake, Paul Quinn, Southwest and Wiley. The men and women of Wiley won the 2014 Red River team championships.
"I am very excited about the move, both for our teams and for me," said Joseph Moses, coach of the Gold Rush and Gold Nuggets since 2004. "It will be a new challenge for our program. We have competed against some of these schools before, and it will be more difficult. But we're going in there with the thought of challenging for the championship. When the gun goes off, we'll be ready."
A second GCAC member from New Orleans, Dillard University, also will compete for the Red River's men's and women's cross country titles in 2015.
The Red River's championship meet will be Nov. 6 in San Antonio, Texas. The NAIA National Championships will be Nov. 21 in Charlotte, N.C.
Ed Cassiere, Sports Information Director
XULAgold.comXAVIER UNIVERSITY OF LOUISIANA
https://twitter.com/xulagold
https://www.facebook.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment