Tufts ties for seventh place in a surprising NESCAC Championship

A crisp fall day provided the backdrop for an unpredictable round of competition at the NESCAC Championship cross-country meet. The event was hosted by Tufts on its' Grafton campus, touted as one of the best spectator courses in New England. Williams College burned through the course on the chilly day to take the crown, while the Jumbos settled for a seventh-place tie with Amherst College.

"It was definitely a cold day. We raced in tights, and in my experience running here we've never had to do that before," senior Heidi Tyson said.

Amongst the strong contingent of eleven NESCAC teams were five teams ranked in the top 25 in the October 29 national coaches poll, making the contest hard-fought in one of the most competitive conferences in the nation. Before the meet, Williams and Middlebury were one and two in the rankings, with Trinity College at 12th, Bowdoin at 17th, and Hamilton at 21st. The Middlebury squad came into the meet as defending champions, having won the event for the past four years. Middlebury, however, proved no match for a stellar Williams team.

Having gained their first NESCAC Championship title since 1997, the Williams squad asserted themselves as the number one nationally ranked Div. III team. The Purple Cows unseated a Middlebury team who has enjoyed and earned the Div. III NCAA national title for two consecutive years. The miniscule 30 points that the team accrued was accomplished by having an unprecedented four of the five scoring runners in the top eight. Not only did the team win the competition, it also boasted the number one individual runner in Caroline Cretti, whose time of 17:35 well surpassed the previous course record of 17:54.9.

While the Jumbos knew that they likely could not catch Williams and Middlebury, they had hoped to be within the top six, but landed instead in a seventh-place tie with Amherst College. Though the overall team finish was not quite what was expected, it doesn't tell the full story of the day's events, which held a few surprises.

A Bowdoin team that showed little activity throughout the months of September and October came busting out of the gates for a third place team finish. The Hamilton squad that was in the top 25 in the national rankings finished behind a Tufts team that wasn't, while a Bates squad that wasn't ranked finished ahead of Tufts in an unprecedented fifth place finish.

"Bates was a big surprise, we didn't expect them to be where they were," coach Kristen Morwick said. "But then we also didn't think that we'd beat Trinity, so there were a few results we were surprised by today."

One aspect of the race that went differently from others throughout the season had to do with the pack running style that the Jumbos use. The strength of the Tufts squad lies in its pack, a group of four to five runners who finish third through seventh for the team. Usually this pack finishes close together, but in this race the pack was slightly broken up and was less of a cohesive unit. This made it less of a scoring threat and was part of the reason for the team finishing in the place it did.

"Everyone ran better than they have before, at least two of the top girls beat their top times by 20 to 30 seconds," freshman Arielle Aaronson said. "But, instead of having four to five strong girls in the pack running together it was split into smaller, less effective groups in terms of scoring. Individually a lot of people had PRs, we just weren't as strong as we could have been as a team."

Junior Lauren Caputo and freshman Becca Ades, a pair that has been working together all season, did so again in this race. Caputo was the first Jumbo to finish, coming in 19th place in a time of 19:13.34, with Ades ten places and 16 seconds behind her. Senior co-captain Mary Nodine played the familiar role of the third Jumbo to complete the course, doing so in 19:40.37 en route to a 40th place finish. Three seconds back and three places later, junior Lauren Dunn crossed the line, with senior Heidi Tyson garnering 52nd in a time of 19:58.96 to round out the scoring five. Seniors Kristen Munson (20:03.22) and Danielle Perrin (20:20.10) completed the top seven for this race, placing 58th and 69th respectively.

While the gap between the third and seventh Jumbos was a respectable 40 seconds, the pack was still not as cohesive as it has been in other races. The race itself was close, with many people finishing in groups of ten within seconds of each other. With the Div. III National Qualifiers looming overhead in two weeks time, the Jumbos will look to regroup the pack and move it up in the standings to pose a formidable scoring threat.

"In this race, the top four were solid, there were some people who stepped up, but some key people didn't have their best day," junior Katie Higley said. "We're just going to take this and refocus. Some people need to run not with their heads but with their hearts. The race can get into your head and instead of letting that happen we just need to run once the gun goes off and not think and let ourselves get pulled to the finish."