Neal Sales-Griffin beat Mark Crain in Thursday’s runoff election for Associated Student Government president by only about 200 votes. Sales-Griffin received 1,498 votes, or 53.5 percent, to Crain’s 1,301 votes, or 46.5 percent.

Despite picking up 555 new votes in Thursday’s election, Crain could not overtake the margin between him and Sales-Griffin, who finished 17 percentage points ahead after the first round of voting Tuesday.

In the other runoff Thursday, McCormick junior Nate Perkins was elected student services vice president with 58.7 percent of the vote against Weinberg junior Hariharan ‘Harry’ Vijayaraghavan, who collected 41.3 percent. Perkins had not won a majority on Tuesday, forcing the runoff.

About 2,800 students voted in Thursday’s presidential race, compared to about 3,200 in the first round of elections Tuesday, which placed Sales-Griffin, with 40,1 percent, and Crain, with 23.2 percent, in a runoff.

This year’s presidential election featured the largest number of registered candidates, five, since 2005. Though neither ran as an ‘insider’ candidate, Sales-Griffin and Crain had the most experience working with ASG of the five. There was tension between the two campaigns; Sales-Griffin on Tuesday accused Crain’s campaign of tearing down “NSG” flyers in Allison Hall. Crain received an endorsement Wednesday from outgoing ASG President Jonathan Webber, who had previously endorsed third-place finisher Scott Burton. His campaign made a strong push on campus until the polls closed, which Sales-Griffin campaign manager Benjamin Armstrong acknowledged.

“It was close all the way through today and it made us nervous,” the Weinberg freshman said. “We thought that we had this thing dead and today was the first time we even doubted it.”

After the results came in, a dejected Crain said he wished he was on “the other end” and felt he could have pulled off an upset with three more days and more face-to-face time with students.

“I expected it to be closer,” he said. “It was a good run though. Less than 3,000 people voted, which is kind of disheartening.”

Sales-Griffin speculated his absence on Wednesday and Thursday due to family reasons did not help.

“Everybody wants me to be out there and going door-to-door,” he said. “So people were like, ‘Where’s Neal at?'”

Wearing gray sweatpants and a green sweatshirt, Sales-Griffin waited quietly for Thursday’s results in the Institute for Student Business Education office in Norris University Center. He sat inside a circle of a handful of friends and campaign volunteers as the campaign’s theme, The Beatles’ “Come Together,” by drifted out of Sales-Griffin’s friend’s laptop.

When the call came, the room fell silent. Hanging up, the visibly exhausted Sales-Griffin wasted no time in telling everyone what he knew.

“I just got ’em,” Sales-Griffin said.

Cheers erupted and within seconds, everyone was swaying in a group hug nearly as big as the room.

Sales-Griffin, who is the first black ASG president since 1997, choked back tears and thanked everybody present for working hard the last two days while he was off-campus.

“I love you guys … These are happy tears,” Griffin said.

Inside the For Members Only office in the African-American Student Affairs building, Crain and campaign manager Aisha Smith reflected on his run for presidency.

“Regardless of what happens, I think we had an amazing three weeks,” Crain said to Smith.

ASG Elections Commissioner Samir Pendse said the high turnout for Thursday’s runoff was a testament to the work of Sales-Griffin’s campaign.

“You guys should be proud of yourselves, you lit up the whole campus,” the Weinberg sophomore said, addressing the room. “For a runoff, it (usually) goes down half and you got almost the same vote as the last election.”

After two additional days of campaigning with the runoff election, newly-elected SSVP Perkins said he is excited but relieved the results are out and the election process is over.

“My whole campaign team and I worked really hard for this,” he said. “It’s definitely a well-deserved victory.”

Perkins was at Ayers College of Commerce and Industry when a member of the election commission called to inform him of his win.

“I’m very excited to be able to start working on all of these projects that I’ve put so much work into planning out,” he said.

Vijayaraghavan was calm when the results came in, and he immediately called Perkins to congratulate him.

“I’m sure Nate’s going to do an excellent job,” he said. “He’s very well-qualified and will make an excellent SSVP and member of the executive board.”

With a year-long term as president ahead of him, Sales-Griffin said he and ASG have a lot more work to do.

“It’s just beginning,” Sales-Griffin said. “Now we can deliver.”

Ashley Lau, Christina Chaey and Phillip Swarts contributed to this report.