Track & Field • 1974-77 | Cross Country • 1973-76

At Illinois, Craig Virgin won nine Big Ten championships, nine All-American awards and was the 1975 NCAA Cross Country champion. He was a three-time Olympic qualifier in 1976, 1980 and 1984 at 10,000 meters, and is a seven-time American record holder in road and track events. Virgin was a three-time national champion in 10,000 meters at U.S. National Track and Field Championships, and winner of the 1980 Olympic Trials 10,000 meters. He was a nine-time member of the U.S. squad at the World Cross Country Championships and became the first (and still the only) American male to win the IAAF World Cross Country Championships, which he did twice in 1980 and '81. Virgin was inducted into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame, the National USA Track & Field Hall of Fame and the St. Louis Sports Hall of Fame. He broke Steve Prefontaine's national high school two-mile record before attending Illinois. Virgin also broke Prefontaine's American 10,000m record at 27:39.4 in 1979, which was also the second-fastest time ever run in the world at that time.