Conference Action Sets Table for Season’s Final Division III Regional Rankings

NEW ORLEANS—After last weekend’s conference action, the favorites for automatic qualifying solidified in the season’s final NCAA Division III Regional Team Rankings.  The rankings were released on Tuesday by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA).

Two new men’s teams moved up to No. 1, while four more moved up to the No. 2 slot.  In the women’s rankings, 17 of the 18 teams in position for an AQ bid kept their spots locked down.

These final Regional Rankings will be put to the test in less than two weeks as teams around the country compete in regional championships on Saturday, November 15.

Regional Rankings Summary PDF | Week by Week PDF
Men’s Regions | Women’s Regions

DIII XC Rankings Central

The only new top-two women’s team? That would be Centre at No. 2 in the South/Southeast with a win at the SAA Championships.

From there on out, the rest of the changes among teams slotted in the top two came from the men’s rankings.

The two most turbulent regions were the Mideast and the Great Lakes.  In the ME, Haverford kept the top spot after winning the Centennial Conference, but the next nine teams changed places based on results from the Centennial, MAC, UAA, and Landmark.  No. 2 Johns Hopkins moves up one rank after being ranked No. 1 most of the fall, and No. 3 Widener hits yet another all-time high.  The Pride have never qualified for NCAAs.

In the GL, Wabash and Calvin stayed at 1-2, but the OAC, HCAC, MIAA, NCAC, and UAA shook up the next eight.  No. 4 Rose-Hulman (up four) and No. 5 Hope (up five) made the two biggest jumps in this week’s rankings. Rose-Hulman took the Heartland with an impressive nine-second spread.

After SUNY Geneseo only beat SUNY Cortland by four points at the SUNYAC meet, St. Lawrence moved up to No. 1 in the Atlantic. Geneseo (which did receive a third of the region’s first place votes) stepped down a slot to No. 2, and No. 3 Cortland moved up two slots.

While Geneseo and SLU have traded the Atlantic’s top spot back and forth all season, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps only surrendered the West No. 1 ranking to Pomona-Pitzer for one week.  CMS reclaimed its status as the West’s top-ranked team after beating the Sage Hens at SCIACs.  No. 2 Willamette is sandwiched between the two adjacent Angeleno schools.

In the Central, No. 2 Loras and No. 3 Central (Iowa) flip-flopped after Loras pulled off a minor upset at the IIAC championship meet.  Central’s top runner, Eli Horton, missed the meet with a calf strain, but one of the Duhawks’ usual top five also finished out of their top seven.  The battle between the two squads for the Central’s second spot is sure to be tight.

A resurgent UW-Platteville squad moved up to No. 5 in the Midwest after beating UW-Oshkosh and UW-Stout in the annual bloodbath that is the WIAC meet.  Oshkosh and Stout each moved down one ranking to Nos. 6 and 7, respectively.

Bridgewater (Va.) jumps into the all-important South/Southeast No. 2 slot after beating No. 4 Washington & Lee to win the ODAC.  (Also of note in the S/SE: No. 10 Birmingham-Southern is regionally ranked for the first time in two years).

While there wasn’t much movement atop the women’s regional rankings, teams a bit further down the list did make moves toward the top.

In the Atlantic, the No. 4 RIT women climbed up from No. 8, making the nation’s biggest regional jump, tied with South/Southeast No. 3 Christopher Newport. That’s the highest regional ranking for the Rochester Institute of Technology since at least 2010, and its best regional finish in school history is 2006’s sixth place. While they only put one runner in St. Lawrence’s top five at the Liberty League meet, the RIT women impressively put five in the national No. 2’s top seven.

St. Thomas (Minn.) took over as No. 3 in the Central, demoting St. Benedict to No. 4 after the Tommies beat the Blazers at MIACs.  Mount Union and Case Western Reserve made the same switch in the Great Lakes.  No. 4 Puget Sound flip-flopped with No. 5 Whitman after they finished in that order in the NWC.

In a battle for what’s likely to be vital national-qualifying slots in New England, No. 4 Amherst and No. 5 Colby each moved up one after beating No. 6 Tufts at NESCACs.

Mideast teams Nos. 3-7 reshuffled after No. 3 Dickinson beat No. 4 Haverford and No. 6 Swarthmore at the Centennial meet; No. 5 Carnegie Mellon and No. 7 Allegheny each move up after impressing at conferences.

USTFCCCA Regional Cross Country Rankings are determined subjectively by a single member coach in each respective region, or by a panel of coaches in the region. The regional representative is tasked with weighing returning team strength with current-season results in determining predicted team finishes at the NCAA Regional Championships.