STORRS, Conn. - UConn Director of Cross Country and Track & Field Greg Roy announced that senior Eric Van Der Els (Norwalk, Conn.) has been named team captain of the cross country team for the second-straight season.

Van Der Els captained last season's squad in their final season in the American Athletic Conference and will lead this year's team into the BIG EAST Championship on Friday, March 5.

"Eric has come a long way since freshman year," stated Roy.  "He's a great student, a great athlete, and a great leader . I feel so confident in his ability to help his teammates as well as himself achieve at their highest levels."

In the two races this spring season, Van Der Els has been the Huskies' top-finisher at both.  He took 48th place posting a time of 24:25.8 FSU Winter Classic in a field stacked with nationally ranked teams.  At the Spider-Patriot Invite, he was third overall leading the Huskies to a second place finish.

In his last season in 2019, Van Der Els broke through in a big way, earning All-AAC honors by finishing 8th overall with a time of 24:26.  He then followed that up with an All-Northeast Region performance at the NCAA Regional in Buffalo, clocking in at 29:08.3 on the 10K course.  He finished 15th overall in a field of 265 runners and UConn was 8th in the 37 team field.  He had his fastest 8K time of the year at the Princeton Invitational where he was 10th with a time of 24:10.0 as UConn finished 2nd.  All that came after he defended his UMass Invite title by winning the season opener for the second-straight season.

Van Der Els and the Huskies will run at the BIG EAST Championship on Friday at the WakeMed Cross Country Complex in Cary, North Carolina.