In a streak of unbelievable proportions in any sport, at any level, the Wisconsin men's cross country team won the program's twelfth straight conference title, and 44th overall in front of a home crowd at Zimmer Championship Course in Verona Sunday.
The Badgers' victory was led by individual champion, senior Landon Peacock, who overtook Indiana's Andrew Bayer in the final 30 meters to claim the title by half of a second with a time of 23 minutes, 40.8 seconds. Peacock became the program's 27th individual Big Ten champion and the first Badger since Matt Withrow in 2007.
Wisconsin won the championship with an incredibly miniscule score of 28. The next closest team, Indiana, finished with a score of 75, with third place finishers, Minnesota, scoring 101.
In addition to Peacock's fantastic effort, the Morley, Mich. native was joined by three other Badgers in the top six. Sophomore Mohammed Ahmed, who led the race rounding the final turn before being overtaken by Peacock and Bayer, finished fourth with a time of 23 minutes, 43 seconds. Meanwhile, junior Elliot Krause and sophomore Maverick Darling took fifth and sixth place, respectively, both coming in at under 24 minutes.
Wisconsin's current streak of 12 straight Big Ten titles is the fifth longest in conference history of any sport. The team has won 29 titles in the last 34 years.
The top four individual finishers for the Badgers each earned first-team all-conference honors, while sophomore Reed Conor, who finished 12th, claimed second-team honors. This marks the second year in a row Wisconsin has found itself with four runners on the first team.
""There was a lot of pressure on our kids coming into this race,"" head coach Mick Byrne said. ""This is a great weekend for our program and a great weekend for Wisconsin.""
Byrne and his Badgers now move forward in preparation for the NCAA Great Lakes Regional Championship Nov. 13 in Rochester, Mich., where the team will look to claim its sixth National title and first since 2005.
-UWBadgers.com contributed to this report.
