2022 NCAA DIII Men’s Cross Country National Coaches’ Poll – Week 8
NEW ORLEANS – And then there were 32.
Here is the newest edition of the NCAA DIII Men’s Cross Country National Coaches’ Poll, as released on Tuesday by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA). Voting coaches only considered those teams that will be competing at the 2022 NCAA DIII Cross Country Championships on Saturday in East Lansing, Michigan.
NCAA Division III — Men's Cross Country
This Week's National Top Five
1
Pomona-Pitzer
Pomona-Pitzer
2
MIT
MIT
3
North Central (Ill.)
North Central (Ill.)
4
Williams
Williams
5
Wartburg
Wartburg
Cross Country Polls & Rankings
Five of the top-6 teams remained in the same spot after Regional Championships Saturday – because they handled business.
- West Region champion Pomona-Pitzer enters the NCAA meet as the prohibitive favorite to win a third consecutive national title and collected seven of 10 possible first-place votes
- MIT, which snagged the three remaining first-place votes, hasn’t budged from the No. 2 spot all season and dominated the proceedings this past weekend at the East Region Championships
- North Central (Ill.) dispatched all comers at the Midwest Region Championships and is cemented at No. 3
- Midwest Region runner-up Wartburg sits No. 5 with Mideast Region runner-up RPI at No. 6.
Williams continued its ascension in the National Coaches’ Poll, jumping three spots from No. 7 to No. 4 after winning the team title at the Mideast Region Championships. Led by individual champion Elias Lindgren, the Ephs put six of their seven athletes in the top-15 and topped the Engineers, 40-57. Williams fell as far as No. 12 in Week 2 this year, but worked its way into the top-5 for the first since the preseason (where, true to form, it was also ranked No. 4).
Twenty-five of the next 26 spots changed hands, which are too many to list.
We’ll highlight several of the biggest movers between Week 7 and Week 8.
- North champion UW-Whitewater soared to No. 7 with North runner-up UW-La Crosse slotted right behind it at No. 8
- Mid-Atlantic champion Carnegie Mellon improved two spots from No. 11 to No. 9
- South runner-up Lynchburg jumped six spots from No. 25 to No. 19
- East runner-up Bates climbed six spots from No. 30 to No. 24
- Great Lakes third-place squad Mount Union charged seven spots from No. 35 to No. 28
Remember that the 2022 NCAA DIII Cross Country Championships will be held this Saturday, November 19, at the Forest Akers East Golf Course in East Lansing, Michigan.
