USTFCCCA News & Notes
NCAA DI Regional Previews: Great Lakes, Mid-Atlantic, Northeast
Courtesy: Tyler Mayforth & Kyle Terwillegar, USTFCCCA November 10, 2016   

NCAA DI Regional Previews: Great Lakes, Mid-Atlantic, Northeast

NEW ORLEANS — Are you ready to see months of hard work pay off?

It’s Regional Championship Weekend and we’ll see what teams and individuals earn automatic bids to the NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships, which are set for November 19 in Terre Haute, Indiana.

QUICK LINKS: Regional Championship Central | Latest Regional Rankings | Latest National Rankings

By the end of the day tomorrow, we’ll see 36 teams punch their ticket to NCAAs and scores of individuals as well. After the dust settles, we’ll get an idea of what teams earned at-large bids as well.

Allow us to break down three major storylines in each region. We’ll group three regions in each post, based on location.

GREAT LAKES

Host: Wisconsin
Location: Madison, Wisconsin
Women – 12 p.m CT; Men – 1 p.m. CT

TIMING SITE

WOMEN

Projected Auto Bids: Michigan, Eastern Michigan

  • Eastern Michigan has waited 20 long years to return to the NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships. The last time the Eagles went was back in 1996. Many of the current athletes were barely one-year old or glimmers in their parents’ eyes when EMU finished 22nd in Tucson, Arizona. Now the Eagles enter this Friday’s meet ranked 2nd in the region and have some impressive performances to their credit already (3rd at Notre Dame and 7th at Pre-Nats). Look for the EMU to be led once again by the strong duo of Jordan McDermitt and Natalie Cizmas.
  • One of the nation’s longest streaks is in danger this weekend. Michigan State has made 15 consecutive NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships dating back to 2001. It’s the second longest streak in the nation behind Stanford’s run of 23. The Spartan enter the regional meet ranked fourth behind Michigan, Eastern Michigan and Notre Dame. Michigan State must either put together a special race or rely on at-large points.
  • Ever since Erin Finn lost to Brenna Peloquin at the Roy Griak Invitational, the Michigan standout has been on a tear. Finn has won three consecutive races and will look to make it four in a row here. It won’t be easy for Finn, as she faces Notre Dame’s Anna Rohrer. Both women won by the same margin (25 seconds) at their respective conference meets. Rohrer is the top returning finisher from the regional meet last year (2nd), but Finn is on another level at this point of the season.
MEN

Projected Auto Bids: Wisconsin, Michigan State

  • One of the teams with the biggest questions to answer is No. 29 Michigan. The Wolverines are looking for their sixth-straight trip to NCAAs, but will need to bounce back from a disappointing fifth-place showing at the Big Ten Championships – after entering as the favorite and defending champ – behind three other teams in this region in No. 14 Wisconsin, No. 18 Michigan State and No. 21 Indiana. Last year, this region only sent two teams to the NCAA Championships, so the margin for error could be small.
  • Bouncing back is also the theme for Wisconsin, though the Badgers are trying to atone for last year’s missteps, not last month’s. Wisconsin missed NCAAs for the first time since 1971 last season, but seems to be on the path to redemption after a come-from-behind win over Michigan State at the Big Ten Championships. Conversely, can Michigan State summon the same magic it wielded in its runner-up finish? They were unable to hold on to their early-race lead as the 8K race drew to its conclusion, with two more kilometers being added to the proceedings this weekend.
  • Looking to usurp the Big Ten dominance of this region (six of the top seven teams in the last Regional Rankings) will be MAC Champion No. 25 Eastern Michigan, which hasn’t been to NCAAs since 2005. The Eagles were perfect en route to the conference win, and showed flashes of promise at the Wisconsin Invitational with a relatively tight 30-second spread between its first and fourth runners – all better than 90th-place – in a 17th-place finish ahead of 18th-place Michigan State.

 

MID-ATLANTIC

Host: Penn State
Location: University Park, Pennsylvania
Women – Noon ET; Men – 1 p.m. ET

TIMING SITE

WOMEN

Projected Auto Bids: Penn State, Villanova

  • Penn State enters the meet as the odds-on favorite to win the championship, but the battle for runner-up should be wide-open. We got a great preview of it in early October when Georgetown, West Virginia, Penn and Villanova met up at the Paul Short Run. The Hoyas edged the Mountaineers and Quakers 119-127-127. Since then Georgetown has been on a little bit of a slide, finishing 22nd at the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational and 3rd at the BIG EAST Championships behind Providence and Villanova. If the Wildcats run like they have recently, they could secure their 28th NCAA bid in history.
  • Speaking of the Hoyas, their 11-year streak of making NCAAs as a team is in jeopardy. Georgetown is currently ranked 5th in the region and doesn’t appear to have enough at-large points to be selected, so it’s “Top-2 or Bust” in State College, Pennsylvania. The Hoyas need Kennedy Weisner, Autumn Eastman and Josette Norris to run up to their potential.
  • The NCAA Division I Women’s Cross Country Championship has been around since 1981. Penn has yet to qualify for the race in 34 years. The Quakers, currently ranked 3rd in the region, are in a good position to change that. Penn must regain the form it used to finish 3rd at the Paul Short Run than its 3rd-place finish at the Heps. The Quakers won’t need to worry about what they’ll get from senior Ashley Montgomery, who was an individual NCAA qualifier last year and placed second at the Paul Short Run and 13th at the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational in mid-October.

MEN

Projected Auto Bids: Georgetown, Penn

  • Regional favorite No. 22 Georgetown has topped No. 28 Penn twice this year at the Paul Short Run and the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational, but both teams went on to win respective BIG EAST and Ivy League titles (Penn’s first in 43 years). The Hoyas are the reigning regional winners, while Penn will be looking to follow up its historic Heps title with its first-ever Mid-Atlantic crown.
  • Under the radar, Navy is ranked third in the Mid-Atlantic and are looking to break through for its first NCAA berth since 1997. The Midshipmen will try to crack the top-two, as it is likely that only the two automatic qualifying teams will advance to NCAAs from this region. At Paul Short, Navy was one of only two teams with seven runners in the top-80, but was also the only contender in that race without a finisher better than 20th.
  • Though they are led by an individual national title contender in Patrick Tiernan, the Villanova Wildcats are at risk of missing the NCAA Championships for consecutive years for the first time since 2004 through 2006. Nova is ranked fifth in the region heading into Penn State this weekend.

 

NORTHEAST

Host: Metro Atlantic Conference
Location: Bronx, New York
Women – 11 a.m. ET; Men – Noon ET

WOMEN

Projected Auto Bids: Providence, Harvard

  • Harvard has only made three NCAA Division I Cross Country Championship fields as a team: 1982, 1983 and 2012. The way the stars are aligning this season, the Crimson could very well add another year to that ledger. Harvard enters the regional meet ranked 2nd behind Providence. The Crimson easily handled four of those teams they’ll face at the Heptagonal Championships and Syracuse has yet to impress.
  • Providence has fallen a long way since being the unanimous No. 1 in the NCAA Division I Women’s Cross Country National Coaches’ Poll — maybe not in ranking but in stature. The Friars finished 3rd at the Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational and looked vulnerable at the BIG EAST Championships despite winning. This would be a great opportunity for Providence to flex its muscle again ahead of what should be its 27th NCAA appearance. A strong race from 2015 XC All-American Sarah Collins, Brianna Ilarda and Millie Paladino would go a long way to getting the Friars back on track.
  • It’s been a while since Yale made it to NCAAs as a team: 2001, to be exact. The Bulldogs went five years in a row from 1986 to 1990, took a nine-year hiatus and returned in back-to-back years in 2000 and 2001. Yale enters this year’s meet ranked 3rd in the region behind Providence and Harvard. The Bulldogs showed some fight earlier this season when they won the Paul Short Run over a strong field and need a similar effort to capture an automatic bid here.
MEN

Projected Auto Bids: Syracuse, Iona

  • With only two and three team qualifiers to the past two NCAA Championships, respectively, pickings will likely be slim for berths to Terre Haute this year. Especially when taking into account the two auto berths will likely go to defending national champion No. 5 Syracuse and No. 7 Iona.
  • Third is going to be an important spot if no one can usurp those top teams, and it’s a spot currently occupied by No. 30 Providence. The Friars have been up-and-down this year with strong performances at Notre Dame and BIG EASTs, and less-than-impressive efforts by comparison at Wisconsin and the Coast-to-Coast Battle in Beantown.
  • If not Providence in that third spot, it will likely come down to a rerun of the Ivy League Championships (minus champ Penn and runner-up Princeton). Columbia, Dartmouth, Yale and Cornell all occupy the next four slots in the Regional Rankings. Columbia topped Dartmouth and Yale by about 30 points, and those two close teams beat Cornell by a similar margin.