Tufts stormed the beach on Saturday taking second place in the ECAC Championships at the ocean-side Harkness Memorial State Park in Waterford, Conn. The finish was the highest ever for the Tufts women in ECACs, as the Jumbos customarily race their second seven runners in order to rest their top seven women for this upcoming weekend's Div. III New England Regionals.
"It was a great meet for us and we almost pulled it off versus a very tough Amherst team," coach Kristen Morwick said.
Junior Samantha Moland (22:53) and freshman Morgan Medders (23:04) both earned All-ECAC honors for their performances, with Moland taking ninth and Medders following in 11th.
It's been three weeks since Moland has raced for the Jumbos because of health issues, but she was not affected by her downtime.
"It was amazing after having such a rollercoaster season, but I was ready for it," Moland said.
For Medders, it was only her second 6k as a collegiate runner. In last weekend's 5k, Medders was the first women's collegiate finisher in the open race.
"She's just been improving throughout the end of the season," junior tri-captain Jenny Torpey said. "She definitely stepped it up."
"I know she's been coming up slowly all season, but just like all the freshmen, they've just constantly been improving and very quietly sneaking up into the top positions," sophomore Laura Walls said. "I'm not surprised. She works very hard in practice."
Towards the end of the race, a coach from Williams instructed one of his runners to stay matched with Walls, looking to break the race open down the stretch. The move backfired, as Walls stepped on the gas and passed the Eph runner.
"It was more just that I just wanted to prove the Williams coach wrong," Walls said.
Senior Arielle Aaronson (23:14) took 16th and freshman Susan Allegretti (23:21) was right behind her in 18th. Walls rounded out the Jumbos' scoring by sprinting the last few hundred meters to take 19th (23:22).
"There were just outstanding races by Moland, Medders, and Laura Walls, who passed at least 10 people in the last 200 meters," Morwick said.
"I was happy," Walls said. "I haven't shown a lot of improvement from freshman year so this is a big personal record. I was happy it came during the championship race when it counted."
Torpey (22:45) and sophomore Anna Shih (22:46) took 33rd and 34th for the Jumbos. The two were the fastest sixth and seventh team finishers of any team at the meet.
Throughout the week, Tufts prepared to beat Williams, who was assumed to have the most depth and the strongest team coming into this weekend. But the bigger threat turned out to be Amherst as the Lord Jeffs took first and beat the Jumbos by two points, finishing the day with 71 to Tufts' 73. Amherst raced a member of its top seven in the race, which may have given the Jeffs the victory.
"If we had put anyone from our top seven in there - [freshman Katie] Rizzolo, [sophomore Katy] O'Brien, [junior Sarah] Crispin, [freshman Evelyn] Sharkey - we'd have won by 20 or more points," Morwick said.
Every single member of the ECAC team achieved a personal record. "Overall, we were really proud of our performance," Torpey said. "Two points isn't really that much. They have a really strong team, too. I think it would have been nice to win but on the day, it was a really good performance."
Teammates cheered the Jumbos throughout the race as the top seven Tufts runners as many team members travelled to Connecticut to motivate the participants.
"The girls who weren't racing were cheering all along the race," Moland said. "They were around every corner. That made a big difference and it definitely helped us out."
The ECAC runners will return the favor next weekend as Tufts travels out to Springfield college to compete for one of the top five spots for Nationals next week at the New England Regionals.
