MEET PREVIEWS: NCAA DIII Regional Championships

NEW ORLEANS — Regional Championship Weekend is upon us in NCAA Division III Cross Country!

Each of the eight regions in NCAA DIII will compete on Saturday for coveted spots at the 2016 NCAA Division III Cross Country Championships held November 19 in Louisville, Kentucky. As a refresher, the top-2 teams from each region earn automatic bids and then a point system is used to pick the remaining at-large entries.

USTFCCCA InfoZone: Regional Championship Central

We’ll go ahead and highlight three regions to keep an eye on and break down the race for the team title. You can find a list of the remaining regions and their ranked teams down below.

New England Region

Saturday, November 12 | Host: Westfield State
Women’s Race: 11 a.m. ET | Men’s Race: Noon ET

What happens in Westfield, Massachusetts on Saturday has a chance to really shake up the NCAA Division III Cross Country landscape, specifically the National Coaches’ Polls.

There will 14 teams in action that were ranked in the most recent polls. Breaking it down further, that’s an even split with seven men’s teams and seven women’s teams.

The women’s race will be a dandy as five of those seven teams are in the top-10. That includes defending region and national champion Williams, No. 2 MIT, No. 6 Tufts, No. 8 Bates and No. 10 Middlebury.

Dating back to 2005, Middlebury has won the most titles (5) with its last coming in 2011. MIT and Williams have both won three and split the past four as the Engineers come out on top in the even years and the Ephs in the odds.

Many of these teams raced each other back in September at the Purple Valley Classic. MIT finished runner-up behind meet champion SUNY Geneseo, but topped the rest by a large margin. If the Engineers do that once again, voters might be hard-pressed not to throw a first-place vote or two their way in the final poll of the season.

The Williams men have been in a class of their own in this region since 2005. Seven of the past 11 titles have been won by the Ephs, including two of the past three. And what would you know: Williams is the top-ranked team in the field, coming in at No. 3.

If the results from the aforementioned Purple Valley Classic hold, it seems like the Ephs will make add more hardware to their collection. Williams finished runner-up to SUNY Geneseo, yet handed losses to four of those ranked teams (Brandeis wasn’t entered).

Midwest Region

Saturday, November 12 | Host: UW-Oshkosh
Women’s Race: 11 a.m. CT | Men’s Race: Noon CT

North Central (Ill.) dominated the men’s race in this region from 2008 to 2014. The Cardinals won seven consecutive regional titles, including the past three races that were held in Wisconsin.

Last year UW-Eau Claire got the best of North Central (Ill.) in an incredibly close finish. The eventual national champion Blugolds edged the Cardinals 54-60 as the former’s top-end power (3-4-6) proved to be too much.

Here’s some bad news for the rest of the region: North Central (Ill.), the No. 1 team in the nation, is better than ever and through playing games.

The Cardinals swept the CCIW Championships two weeks ago and scored an average of 25 points at the Kollege Town Sports Invitational and the Louisville Classic on their way to absolute routes. The Kollege Town Sports Invitational was held on this very course and North Central (Ill.) demolished UW-Eau Claire 24-73.

While it’s not written in stone that the Cardinals win their eighth regional title in the past nine years, it’s hard to imagine them not. That leaves four other ranked teams the chance to duke it out for the remaining auto bid to NCAAs and after UW-Eau Claire edged UW-La Crosse 41-50 at the WIAC Championships, fans could be in for a treat when you add in No. 11 Washington (Mo.), No. 25 Augustana (Ill.) and No. 35 UW-Platteville.

As far as the individual title goes, it’s Ian LaMere‘s race to lose. He won by 28 seconds here last year over Zach Plank and LaMere has shown no signs of slowing down as a senior.

The women’s race has belonged to Washington (Mo.) in the past and judging by the rankings, that trend could continue. The Bears, who are ranked 4th in the nation, have won six of the past 11 team titles.

WASH U ran away with the title last year (68-106) and returns many of those same runners that helped it do it. The Bears also won on this course in mid-October and put three in the top-15 of a 529-woman race in the process.

Don’t overlook UW-La Crosse either or upstart St. Norbert, led by Erin Artz.

Atlantic Region

Saturday, November 12 | Host: Rowan
Women’s Race: 11 a.m. ET | Men’s Race: Noon ET

This meet will be a perfect opportunity for two former No. 1 teams in the nation to assert themselves once again. That’s right: Both are from SUNY Geneseo.

Earlier this season, the Knights had the top-ranked men’s and women’s team. SUNY Geneseo became the first school in NCAA Division III history to have both No. 1 teams at the same time.

Starting with the men, they still have one first-place vote in the poll but that’s a far cry from when they were the unanimous No. 1 a few weeks ago. The Knights can gain some favor back with the voting coaches and instill some fear in North Central (Ill.) at the same time if they handle business against No. 9 RPI, No. 20 NYU, No. 22 St. Lawrence and No. 31 SUNY Oneonta.

Over in the women’s race, which will be the first to go off on Saturday, No. 3 SUNY Geneseo takes on two other teams ranked in the top-15: No. 11 Ithaca and No. 14 SUNY Oneonta. The Knights made it look easy against SUNY Oneonta at the SUNYAC Championships (28-43) and beat Ithaca most recently at the Border Battle by a score of 136-211.

Individually, there is little reason to believe SUNY Geneseo’s Isaac Garcia-Cassani and Stevens’ Amy Regan won’t win here. Both have looked incredibly strong throughout the 2016 season and Regan is undefeated for quite some time.

Best Of The Rest

Each of the five other regions have ranked teams in them.

The Central Region, Great Lakes Region and Mideast Region all have nine ranked teams, while the West Region has six and the South/Southeast Region has four. The top-ranked women’s team is John Hopkins in the Mideast Region and the top remaining ranked men’s team is No. 8 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps in the West Region.

Take a look at each of those ranked teams and you’ll see the impact each of those meets could have on the next National Coaches’ Poll.