A deep men's cross country team took fourth out of 44 teams at the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championships in Bristol, R.I.
Like many other teams in the region, the Jumbos used this race as an opportunity to rest their varsity squad for next Saturday's Regionals. With their top eight finishers from the NESCACs sitting, the Jumbos still finished with 149 points — their best finish in the meet since 2004.
Sophomore Sam Haney and junior Connor Rose — who led the squad — crossed the line in 12th and 13th place, respectively, out of 300 athletes. Haney finished the 8,000-meter course in a time of 26:36, with Rose less than half a second behind him. The pair both secured All-ECAC honors with their top-15 finishes.
"Having run it two years ago and getting caught in the middle of the pack in the woods areas where it really funnels down, I made it a goal to be in the top five after a quarter-mile," Rose said. "After a mile, I was right where I wanted to be and it was good to know that Sam was right there behind me."
Williams won the meet — in which the winner is the team with the lowest finishes and thus least points — with 94 points, followed by Middlebury with 123. Johnson and Wales, which raced its squad's top seven performers, took third with 142 points, just seven ahead of Tufts (149).
"We did well as a team," Rose said. "The teams we lost to were all running some of their [top] runners, so it was a little bit skewed."
Freshman Brian McLaughlin was Tufts' third finisher in 33rd place, with a time of 27:11. The final Tufts scorers were senior Andrew Bellet and freshman Andrew Shapero, who finished in 44th and 47th place, respectively.
"It got out really slow and I kind of got boxed in for the first 2,000 meters or so, but after that I was able to move up pretty well," Bellet said. "It's always fun to be in a race with around 300 people, because there's always somebody to look up to and always a goal ahead."
"I was pretty happy with it as a career-ending race," Bellet continued. "Looking back, I would have tried to get out harder at first but I think I was still able to move up well, so it was a good effort."
The conditions this weekend were a nice change for those who, last weekend, had run NESCACs on the sloppy and muddy course.
"For the guys who ran NESCACs, I think it was a better finale than NESCACs would have been," Rose said. "For the guys who didn't, it was a good opportunity to run a championship race and a chance to be in the top of a race. [The guys who didn't run NESCACs] were coming off a three-week break and it's tough to go that length of time without putting in a big effort and then be expected to have that extra gear. But I think everyone was pleased [with] their performance and with how our seasons ended."
Placing its first five finishers in the top 50 of the race showed just how strong the Tufts squad is this season, Rose said.
"It shows that other than our top pack, we still have a lot of guys that can fill spots," he said. "It's good knowing that if someone on the regionals team doesn't do well, the difference between him and the next guy is almost nothing and that goes back to almost the 10th guy. That gives a sense of security in races and in workouts that we have our 10th guy in the same pack as our fourth and fifth guys."
After having rested this weekend, the Jumbos' top seven runners will suit up on Saturday for their most important meet to date: the NCAA New England Regional Championships, hosted by Williams at Mount Greylock High School in Williamstown, Mass.
The top two teams at Regionals will receive automatic bids to the Nationals, and the region will also receive up to three at-large bids.
"There are more than five teams who are worthy of Nationals bids because our region is so deep, so it's always a battle to win one of those spots," Rose said. "For the past few years we've come up short for one reason or another, but this year more than ever we really could have two guys not even finish and the difference with the next two guys filling their spots would be almost nothing, so I think that is an advantage we have over other teams."
