2012 NCAA Regional Formchart – Northeast Region
by John Kellogg
November 7, 2012
Editor’s Note: LetsRun.com’s coaching/stat guru John Kellogg has done what basically no one else in the world would have the expertise/patience to do – predict what is going to happen at Friday’s NCAA D1 cross-country regionals. The top two teams in each region and top four individuals not on a team that qualifies will make it to NCAAs. Then 13 at large teams will be added in and two at large individuals. Message board poster “devils advocate” has run the numbers for the qualifiers on the men’s side which appears below and here. We imagine even the great John Kellogg is bound to have missed someone in these predictions, so if you have corrections, please email them to us.
Mr. Kellogg seemingly comes out of hibernation every few months to make predictions in the running world. He did Regional previews in 2011 and 2008 and in the spring of 2011, he said it wouldn’t surprise him if someone ran faster than 2:03:59 in Boston and then Geoffrey Mutai ran 2:03:02 and after the race everyone (except us) was saying the unthinkable had happened.
Mr. Kellogg has scoured the season’s results – with the most weight given to recent (conference meet) performances – to take a guess at who should be the top 25 individuals and few teams in each of the nine regions. A lot of runners were considered for the top 25 and he’ll undoubtedly get quite a few wrong – someone just outside his top 25 has just as good a chance as someone who just made it – and there are always a couple of huge surprises. Team scores are generally based on the strengths of the top teams relative to each other (discounting many of the runners outside the top 25 or so from non-contending teams) and will probably end up being higher than he’s listed them due to displacement from those individuals. In short, this is a pretty good general idea of who should be in the hunt, but it’s still bound to get a bunch of it completely wrong. So basically this is all for S&Gs. We hope you enjoy them. For more on the logic behind the picks, please see last year’s instructions.
Give Us Your Own Predictions in the LetsRun.com NCAA Fan Polls.
Northeast
Hammonasset Beach State Park, Madison, Connecticut
Men
John Kellogg (r) enjoys the 2008 Heps XC meet with his former prized pupil, the 28:06 performer Wejo (dressed as the BK man)
Individuals
Iona and Syracuse combined for 9 of the top 16 spots in last year’s edition of this race. Those two teams (and probably Columbia) stand to entrench several runners at the tête de la course this time around as well. The top returner is Iona’s Mitch Goose (how does he have any eligibility left, anyway?), who was 5th last year (40th at NCAAs). He could be accompanied by several teammates, most notably Matt Gillespie, who produced an astounding 3rd place finish at the Wisconsin adidas Invitational in mid-October. Matt Bayley was the 43rd finisher at Nationals last year and could also be a potential winner here (if he runs), but he took a mulligan and finished in 17th along with a couple of Iona’s B teamers at the MAAC championships, which the Gaels won easily as usual, this time with a “subpar” 16 point total. So Bayley is seeded a little lower here than he could potentially run. Syracuse’s Martin Hehir and Providence’s Shane Quinn, progressing nicely throughout the season and apparently rounding into top form when it counts most, crossed the line in 1st and 2nd at Big East.
As is usually the case in every region, there are some question marks with a few of the potential individual players. Forrest Misenti of Syracuse has been All-Region the last three years, with a high finish of 6th in 2010, but hasn’t raced since the first meet of the season. Rich Peters of Boston U., a 3:57.83 miler and a pretty strong cross-country runner, hasn’t raced since October 7th, when he was runner-up at New Englands. Can he improve enough on his 49th place from last year (when he was only 4th at New Englands) to make All-Region or even contend for an individual NCAA berth? Then there are Harvard’s stars, James Leakos and Maksim Korolev. Based on their excellent results at Wisconsin, either or both of them could finish in the top five here, but following monumental meltdowns in the latter stages at HEPS, it’s difficult to guess at a pre-race seeding for them.
Mitch Goose (Iona)
Matt Gillespie (Iona)
Martin Hehir (Syracuse)
Shane Quinn (Providence)*
Daniel Clorley (Iona)
Joe Whelan (Syracuse)
Matt Bayley (Iona)
Mike Murphy (Columbia)
Leighton Spencer (Columbia)
Christopher Johnson (Colgate)*
Ryan Urie (Syracuse)
Will Geoghegan (Dartmouth)*
Reed Kamyszek (Syracuse)
Eric Speakman (Stony Brook)*
Phil Royer (Dartmouth)
James Leakos (Harvard)
Alex Wallace (Providence)
Jake Byrne (Iona)
Griff Graves (Syracuse)
Maksim Korolev (Harvard)
Jake Sienko (Columbia)
Andrew Palmer (Syracuse)
Max Straneva (Syracuse)
Matt Nussbaum (Yale)
Max Groves (Cornell)
Teams
4th-ranked Iona easily has the strongest team, but the Gaels normally don’t run at full strength in the Regional. With no way of knowing who Iona will rest (if anyone), this preview assumes they’ll all run and hence will win, but that hasn’t been how things have historically played out. Syracuse has won this meet the past three years. Ranked 14th in the coaches poll and fresh off an encouraging win at Big East, expect the Orange to make another title run here vs. an Iona squad that’s holding out a guy or two. Columbia undoubtedly racked up a truckload of points via their 5th-place tie with Arkansas at the huge Wisconsin meet and only needs a top four team finish here to comfortably cruise into Nationals, but the Lions had an off day at HEPS and would no doubt like to get rolling again and beat Syracuse as they did at Wisco. Dartmouth and Providence, while receiving votes in the poll, do not have the requisite points and, barring some complicated and far-fetched scenario, they need to be in the top three to advance. Harvard completely blew up at HEPS for the second year in a row, but the Crimson beat Dartmouth at Wisco and they have the roster talent to at least be a top 4 team here if they can piece things back together.
- Iona*
- Syracuse*
- Columbia*
*Projected qualifier
Women
Individuals
Dartmouth’s Abbey D’Agostino hasn’t raced in over a month, even missing the Ivy League Championships, but with Providence’s Emily Sisson also just returning to competition after having missed the entire regular season, it’s hard to see the defending champ D’Agostino losing. With a track 5k best of 15:34.54, Sisson is the only runner in the field within 35 seconds of D’Agostino’s 15:19.98 PR. Sisson did compete at Big East and was in the top 15 late in the race, but was unable to finish due to dehydration. Had she finished, the Friars would have been Big East champs; instead they finished 3rd to Georgetown and UConn. In keeping with the policy of recognizing prior accomplishments but giving extra weight to the most recent race, D’Agostino has to be considered the favorite in the region. She’s the NCAA outdoor 5,000m champ and almost made the Olympic team, after all, and her last race was a 19:58 6k at Paul Short to win in a romp by 24 seconds over sub-33:00 10k runner and 2012 Ivy League cross-country champ Katie Kellner. Meanwhile, Sisson actually has a recent sub-par performance to count against her and therefore must be rated slightly farther down in the formchart – but not too far down. Talent and past training don’t completely go away, so don’t be too surprised if Sisson finishes farther up in the standings than 10th (likewise, D’Agostino can’t be at 100%, so a victory isn’t a slam dunk). With Sisson on the comeback road, Sarah Collins has taken up the leader duties for Providence and has been stellar, finishing 6th at Wisconsin and 2nd at Big East. Surprising UConn has two probable low sticks in Allison Lasnicki and Lindsay Crevoiserat, 4th and 6th at Big East. Lasnicki was also 11th at Wisconsin, where HEPS champ Kellner was 15th. A couple of wild cards in the region are Maine’s Corey Conner and New Hampshire’s Keely Maguire. Conner, a sub-16:00 track runner who was 4th in the Northeast Regional in 2010, dominated early meets by huge margins but hasn’t raced since late September. Maguire started the season slowly but has come on strongly to win easily at America East and was All-Region last year.
Abbey D’Agostino (Dartmouth)
Sarah Collins (Providence)
Allison Lasnicki (Connecticut)
Lindsay Crevoiserat (Connecticut)
Katie Kellner (Cornell)
Shelby Greany (Providence)
Laura Nagel (Providence)
Sarah Pagano (Syracuse)
Rachel Sorna (Cornell)
Emily Sisson (Providence)
Emmy Shearer (Cornell)
Jillian King (Boston College)
Corey Conner (Maine)
Heidi Caldwell (Brown)
Liv Westphal (Boston College)
Millie Chapman (Yale)
Lauren Sara (Connecticut)
Olivia Mickle (Brown)
Liana Epstein (Yale)
Keely Maguire (New Hampshire)
Sammy Silva (Harvard)
Margaret Connelly (Brown)
Bridget Dahlberg (Boston College)
Devin McMahon (Cornell)
Shauna McNiff (Connecticut)
Teams
If Sisson can run reasonably well, Providence should take home the team trophy, potentially landing three or possibly four in the top 10 and a 5th runner somewhere near the All-Region cutoff. Cornell, ranked 8th nationally in the coaches poll, took maximum advantage of a D’Agostino-less and Waverly Neer-less HEPS to go 1-2-3 en route to a 31-91 nuking of runner-up Princeton. The Big Red machine took plenty of huge scalps at Wisconsin and only needs a 4th place here to ensure a spot at NCAAs. They’ve had Providence’s number so far, but with Sisson presumably in the mix, they’ll need their best race yet to keep that streak going. But watch out for UConn! The Huskies are zooming up the ranks quickly and are poised to be in the team hunt here. Only 19th at Wisconsin but without Lindsay Crevoiserat, UConn then roared to 2nd at Big East, ahead of Providence (showing why Sisson needs a decent race here for the Friars to win). Crevoiserat is rapidly getting better, which may be enough to mush the Huskies past Cornell and possibly to the overall team win. Lauren Sara was 6th overall in this race a year ago and has broken 34:00 for 10k on the track, but has only been UConn’s 3rd runner so far this season, underscoring how strong their potential is. Boston College, 2nd in the region as a team last year and 12th at NCAAs, faces a vastly improved region this year and may be no better than 5th if a dinged-up Millie Chapman returns to full strength for previously nationally-ranked Yale.
- Providence
- Connecticut
- Cornell
- Boston College
- Yale
All Regions:
*Northeast Region
*Mid-Atlantic
*Southeast
*South
*South Central
*Great Lakes
*Midwest
*Mountain
*West