NEW Atlantic Region XC *2009* thread

I agree with you, but do remember that Plattsburgh is a fast course.

Tang

yes st. lawerance looked really well even if it was a fast course, they smoked plattsburgh

Yes the course looks to be somewhat fast, but isn't it the same course every year. Look at the times compared to the past. Both teams ran great races and deserve to be mentioned in the top 5 in the region (which means RIT/ Fredonia have some catching up to do). Both SLU and Plattsburgh seem to be better than some expected them to be on this thread.

uhh... have you consider the possibility of weather? That could be our answer to the ultimate question whether or not SLU and Platts improved from last year.

pretty sure the weather was almost exactly the same, last years results have it listed as calm, 75, and humid, yesterday was a little gusty at times, a couple degrees cooler, and might of been slightly less humid

No one I talked to mentioned a course change, but they did say it was nice out. The course is pretty fast save the single track section where you run through the woods. It has a great finish as there is a lot of open, grass field to run on where you can see everyone in front of you. However, I don't think anyone would argue that Heymann ran faster than last year because of the weather, so obviously you can't say that about anyone else either.

Also worth noting; Jeremey Beaudette didn't make it on the results for some reason, but he was around T. Fox, also under 16. That's 12 in front of Plattsburghs 4th, for those of you keeping track at home.

Does Heymann look like a Debois slayer to anyone else?

he could challenge dubois but as of right now I see dubois winning the region. Yes over that Peter K.

Who cares how many people they put in front of Plattsburgh's 4th man. 7 get to run at regionals and in a 7 versus 7 packed race the gap that separates these two teams is slim to none. All it takes is 2-3 seconds improvement per person for Plattsburgh to move ahead of SLU in a regional/ NCAA type race. Those other 5 that are in front of Plattsburgh's 4th man don't matter except for bragging rights, and does SLU really need bragging rights over Plattsburgh? SLU has not lost to them in quite a while. On another note Plattsburgh's 5th and 6th men were 17:30/40 type guys last year on this course...now 16:07.

Men

1 Cortland (10) 100

2 Geneseo 86

3 NYU 84

4 St. Lawrence 83

5 Plattsburgh 62

6 TCNJ 51

7 Fredonia 40

8 Ithaca 24

9 Oneonta 20

10 Hamilton 12

ARV (RIT, Rochester, Rowan, Vassar, Brockport)

Women

1 Geneseo (4) 92

2 St. Lawrence (2) 85

3 SUNY Cortland 81

4 Plattsburgh (3) 60

55T TCNJ 49

5T Ithaca College 49

7 NYU 41

8 Rochester 23

9 Hamilton 20

10 Brockport 16

ARV (Vassar, Rowan, Oneonta, Oswego, RIT, Stevens, Fredonia, RPI)

Is this a joke, but Plattsburgh girls received 3 first place votes and yet they are ranked 4th? This is F**ked up lol.

I think it is a typo, the 3 first place votes probably belong in the box above with Cortland, Plattsburgh just got beat by SLU handily. Who would vote them first?

Yea, something isn't right with the rankings. There were 9 first place votes for the women, but Geneseo somehow has 92 points?

Regardless of glitches, THANKS to the folks at TCNJ for taking this on and THANKS for posting the link!

honeywell - i disagree that SLU's 11 in front of Platt's 4 is just for "bragging rights." Having a tight spread is hugely important when you get to a NCAA/regionals type race. Look at SLU's women from last year. They had a fantastic front 3 in Pavlus, Ludington, and Hulton but huge gaps of 1+ minutes fron #3 to 4 and 5. As a result, when they got to NCAA's the team still did well but comparatively not as well as they did at regionals or earlier races because there were plenty of quality runners at NCAA's that finished in the huge gap from 3 to 4.

I think Plattsburgh this year is in a similar situation. Heymann, Yernye and to a lesser extent, Grimm are all good runners but their spread over the weekend was almost 59 seconds. That's not terrible but SLU putting 11 in front of 4 shows what will happen to them at bigger races - teams will be able to pack runners in between Plattsburgh's 3 and 4, 4 and 5 etc etc and Platts could end up losing a lot of points to other teams' displacers.

You're right that SLU doesn't need bragging rights over Platts and having said all of the above, it's the first race of the year, a 5k at that, and means very little. However, SLU did show off some great depth that should serve them very well during the championship season.

Good call Blackheart.

While I feel many may argue that it's the first race, it's a 5k, people get better, blah, blah, blah, the fact remains, it was a race in good conditions basically just between 2 teams fighting for nationals spots, and 1 clearly outshone the other.

If SLU puts 11 (or 12, Beaudette missing in the results?) in front of Plattsburgh's 4, that means that SLU has any number of a dozen runners that will be ready to go at regionals, while Plattsburgh needs 2 guys to step up big time just to have a good top 5. Add Cortland's 7, Geneseo's 7, and NYU's 7 (all debatebly better than SLU's) and you have an ever increasing score on your hands for the Cardinals or Wolfpack or whatever they call themselves these days.

That being said, I think that Plattsburgh has shown that they'll be the AR 5th, and Fredonia/RIT have some serious work to put in if they want to battle for an at-large.

SantaAnna wrote:

That being said, I think that Plattsburgh has shown that they'll be the AR 5th, and Fredonia/RIT have some serious work to put in if they want to battle for an at-large.

After one race Plattsburgh has shown they'll be 5th? I don't see it that way at all. Fredonia, and especially RIT, are unknown quantities at this point. I don't think we'll have an accurate picture until late September.

I wouldn't doubt that Fredonia will come on strong later in the season. RIT hasn't opened up yet, have they?

Alright but if you make that argument you have to also make the argument that Plattsburgh with Heymann way out in front has many more points to pack onto all 5 of SLU's scoring runners versus just the last two for Plattsburgh (regarding your comment that SLU can put 12, 5 of which wont be in the meet, in front of the last two runners for Plattsburgh). There are going to be a lot of people (based off of the cardinal classic) in between Heymann and Ramsey at the regional meet.

So lets say Heymann puts up a 3 at regionals and Ramsey has a is 25 seconds back of Heymann (after being 16 seconds back for 5k)thats probably worth 15 spots. Those 15 runners knocks Ramsey from a 2 (like at the classic) down to a 17 and the same is said for all the other SLU runners. It works both ways.

However I agree, I think that SLU is the better team right now.

I think 15 spots is a bit of an exaggeration. More like 5-10, looking at the past several years of results.

But you're right, it does work both ways You seem to be forgetting that even if a dozen people do finish between Heymann and Ramsey, Platt's 4/5 guys are going to tack on way more than a dozen points if they don't improve, which translates to a huge score at the end of the day. All it would take is a mediocre race from either of them to add 150+ points onto Platt's score, and thats 150 points they can't afford if they want the be 5th.

In this hypothetical battle between Plattsburgh and SLU, I'll take SLU any day at this point. It doesn't matter what kind of race they're in, SLU is almost as good at the top end and much, much deeper beyond their top 3.