EMPORIA, Kan.  Western Colorado's Jan Thewes on Friday earned the Mountaineers' first All-American honor at the NCAA Division II Outdoor Track & Field Championships, racing to a seventh-place finish in the championship final of the men's 3,000-meter steeplechase.

Qualifying for the final from Thursday night's preliminary heats on the opening day of the three-day meet, Thewes crossed the final Friday night in a time of 8 minutes, 54.66 seconds at Welch Stadium on the campus of Emporia State (Kan.) University.

Friday's race saw Thewes in nearly every position within the 12 finalists, opening the race safely in the back of the pack and safely on the outside of the first lap as the pack approached the first hurdle at the end of the front stretch.

On the backstretch after that hurdle he pushed up into the middle of the pack and after the first water jump hurdle, rounded the curve into the front stretch pushing into the top two.

Thewes led the pack after four laps, his time of 4:15.72 at that mark three seconds slower than from his prelims heat the night before.

He slipped back to seventh with 800 meters to go, moved up on the outside to fifth over the next 400 before finishing his race in seventh place, just 11/100ths of a second behind the sixth-place finisher.

Thewes' All-American effort puts Western Colorado on the men's team scoreboard in 22nd place after two days.

Western will put two more runners on the oval during Saturday's final session of the championship meet.

Advancing from Thursday's prelims as the second-fastest qualifier in the women's 1,500m run was Peyton Weiss, whose championship heat will begin at 3:05 p.m. MT.

At 5:30 p.m. MT, Tyler Nord will toe the starting line of the timed final men's 5,000m run in which he is seeded with the fifth fastest time.