Competing at Mission Bay Park in San Diego on Friday, the Cerritos College men's cross country team came in 11th place at the SoCal Preview Meet. The Falcons finished with 267 team points and were barely edged out of the top 10 by Santa Ana College, who had 265 team points. Next Friday, the team will run in the Golden West Invitational at Central Park in Huntington Beach.

Leading the way in the 4-mile run was Faustino Diaz (Warren HS), who came in 33rd place out of 204 runners with a time of 22:06.3. Next up, it was a pair of Falcons that finished almost simultaneously, as Anthony Lopez (Downey HS) was 46th overall in 22:25.3, while Carlos Mendoza (Highland HS) finished in 22:25.9, good for 47th place. They were part of a large pack of runners, as were the final two runners to complete the five-man team scoring.

Alejandro Rios (Chino HS) posted a time of 22:41.4, which put him in 66th place, with Joshua Reinis (Kennedy HS) edging five other runners by less than half a second to record his time of 22:51.0, good for 75th place. Ricardo Cano (Schurr HS) wasn't far behind, as he turned in a clocking of 22:56.5, which put him in 83rd place, with Isaiah Marshall (Carson HS) earning a 101st place time of 23:14.9.

In the 4-mile open run, the remainder of the squad came in sixth place out of 12 schools with 157 team points. They were led by Erick Ayala (Downey HS), who came in 18th place in a time of 22:56.8, while the pairing of Daniel Garcia (Whittier HS) and James Yanez (Long Beach Wilson HS) recorded respective times of 23:32.6 (28th place) and 23:57.7 (30th place). Jerson Ramirez (Jefferson HS) was the third Cerritos runner to complete the course in a time of 24:18.4, which placed him 39th, while Christian Corral (Downey HS) rounded out the team scoring with his 42nd place time of 24:25.1.

Also competing for the Falcons were Ryan Lopez (Montebello HS; 24:25.7), Jorge Puga (Downey HS; 24:40.8), Diego Del Carmen (Huntington Park HS; 24:24.8), George Lopez (Norwalk HS; 25:23.8), Didier Pina (Schurr HS; 25:42.9), Steven Anker (Gahr HS; 26:32.7), Armando Macias (Downey HS; 28:18.6) and Luis Carmona (33:31.7).