The men's cross country team left this weekend's NCAA Championships with a disappointing 23rd place finish out of 24 teams. Competing against the top Div. III teams across the nation, the men entered the tournament expecting to place within the top ten and hoping to break the school mark of seventh place set in 1996.
They did not come close, however, despite entering on the heels of the varsity lineup's successful New England season. At last weekend's New England Regionals, the Jumbos had finished first among Div. III squads.
Team members could not figure out what went wrong, then, at Augustana College in Illinois this weekend. "We're all pretty puzzled about what went wrong on Saturday," freshmen Nate Brigham said.
Highlighting the team's struggles was the race of senior co-captain J.R. Cruz. Typically the team's most dependable runner, Cruz finished fifth on the team and 195th overall with a time of 27:10. Throughout the season, Cruz had led the team consistently - coming in as Tufts' top finisher in five of the six meets in which he raced.
The team's finishes were unusual in general, though, as Cruz was not the only Jumbo to experience a rough day. Senior Justin Lewis was Tufts' top finisher of the day, finishing in 109th place overall (25:52), followed by senior Jason Mann (25:58). While both Mann and Lewis are among the team's top runners, without Cruz and fellow senior co-captain Ben Smith to lead the way, the team could not run at maximum strength. Smith finished third on the team and 135th overall (26:10).
"There's no one thing that sticks out," Brigham said. We feel that we prepared ourselves to run our best race on Saturday and it went the other way."
The Jumbos entered the race hoping to beat out most of the New England teams. And considering their finish at the New England Regional meet, these hopes were not unwarranted. But despite their season-long dominance of most New England squads, the Jumbos were beaten Saturday by rivals Bowdoin, Williams and MIT (whhich finished 11th, 16th and 20th , respectively, on the day).
The Jumbos' performance represented a disappointing finish to a strong season. But now, with the 2001 cross-country season coming to a close, the focus shifts to the indoor track season.
"It's going to be hard but we just have to put it behind us and move on," Brigham said.
@s:Team doesn't know what went wrong
