HEPS Cross Country 2012

Harvard's 2012 roster -

http://www.gocrimson.com/sports/xc/2012-13/roster

red recruits wrote:

Cornell women have "trimmed" that preliminary roster--a quick check suggests that they lost four projected sophs and added another (unpublicized) frosh, and are down to 52.

Word is that Cornell's is the largest DI women's squad. Apparently they are doing legit xc training too, not just conditioning for t&f.

Keeping that many people happy must be an interesting proposition.

veritas wrote:

Harvard's 2012 roster -

http://www.gocrimson.com/sports/xc/2012-13/roster

Not many women recruits for XC, but they seem like a talented bunch. I do wish in general the roster and article showed times instead of just general titles...

But wow, they got the female Heisman winner... AND SHE'S 16!

1600m 5:03.13

3200m 11:00.62

Every school except Penn has released at least their frosh roster.

C/M Runner wrote:

Not many women recruits for XC, but they seem like a talented bunch. I do wish in general the roster and article showed times instead of just general titles...

But wow, they got the female Heisman winner... AND SHE'S 16!

http://www.wendyshighschoolheisman.com/we-have-our-national-wendys-high-school-heisman-winners/

Agree - listing personal bests would have been nice - I think they have always done this in the past - perhaps they will update these later.

Their male distance recruit from Mass. was a Foot Locker finalist - I believe he finished mid-pack in the final. One of their male mid-distance guys ran a 1:51 high last spring in the 800.

Not to take anything away from the Heisman winner - sounds like an impressive young woman - but this does not carry the same meaning in cross country as it does in football. Dartmouth got the male Heisman winner last year - great kid but a relative unknown among the nation's best distance runners. The Gatorade award is the big one for pure athletic achievement. Heisman seems to focus more on academics, service activities, and good but not stellar performance - just my observations.

veritas wrote:

Not to take anything away from the Heisman winner - sounds like an impressive young woman - but this does not carry the same meaning in cross country as it does in football. Dartmouth got the male Heisman winner last year - great kid but a relative unknown among the nation's best distance runners. The Gatorade award is the big one for pure athletic achievement. Heisman seems to focus more on academics, service activities, and good but not stellar performance - just my observations.

Understood, but I am currently more intregued that they have recruited a 16 year old for their team. I wonder how Saresky will handle that... does anyone know if this has been done in the past, for which teams, and how those athletes ended up? I'm wondering how quickly she can get her times down to something more competitive for college level...

veritas wrote:

C/M Runner wrote:

Not many women recruits for XC, but they seem like a talented bunch. I do wish in general the roster and article showed times instead of just general titles...

Agree - listing personal bests would have been nice - I think they have always done this in the past - perhaps they will update these later.

Courtesy of Al Gore's Internet, I have found some info on the Harvard frosh--I'd urge people to accept the PRs listed as only approximate:

MEN

Chris Allen 1:56 4:16 9:05

Malik Epps 1:54 4:19

Billy Gaudreau 1:57 4:11 9:00

Robert Hogg 1:56 4:28

Johnny Marvin 4:22 9:31

Mathew Murray 1:51 4:35

Thomas Purnell 1:53 3:48m 8:11 14:37 [Marks courtesy of "power of 10"--what a great site!]

Konrad Surkont 4:16 9:13

WOMEN

Kieran Gallagher 2:11 5:19y

Paige Kouba 2:12 4:31m 9:56m 6:57/2kSC

Selena Pasadyn 2:18 5:02 11:10

Emma Payne 5:32 11:54

Some quality recruits on both sides--I'd think that, when you combine this with previous recruiting classes, H would have all the talent they need.

Managed to find a listing of at least some of Penn's recruits that is not on the now-defunct dyestat website:

http://u.milesplit.com/teams/1124

(right-hand column; click on names to get PRs)

Women

Cuccia, Gabby (NY) Mid-distance

Darlington, Amy (PA) Distance/XC

Gensib, Elyssa (NJ) XC / Distance

Grossman, Hannah (PA) Distance/XC

Hennig, Taylor (NY) Sprints/mid-distance

Hlatky, Rachel (OH) Sprints

McCarthy, Shannon (NJ) XC / Distance

Yankelev, Eliana (PA) Hurdles/LJ/HJ

Men

Awad, Thomas (NY) Distance/XC

Bowers, Ben (IL) Jumps/Hurdles

Clark, Brandon (MN) Cross Country

Magaha, Drew (PA) Distance/XC

Mattis, Sam (NJ) Throws

Pitt, Tom (PA) High Jump

Shurtleff, Clark (CT) Distance/XC

Smith, Brendan (NY) Distance/XC

Webb, Kirk (CO) distance/middle distance

And oddily enough, the men recruits were announced back in January 2012.

Hepstrack.com has helpfully collected all the available Ivy rosters/newcomer releases:

http://hepstrack.com/blog/2012/09/05/a-generation-gap/#respond

Regarding Harvard's Pasadyn: I wish her well, but starting college at 16 (with her birthday next month) is hardly unusual. I coached at least one (Ivy) woman, later a Heps champ, in the same situation; my sister-in-law also started at Harvard at 16 (with an October birthday); and I started as a 17-year-old soph at my Ivy, with my birthday in April. Not at all unusual, really (esp. given my soph classmates who were 16 and 15!).

Of course the question is whether an athlete as young as Pasadyn can contribute athletically at a top level before graduating, but then women *do* tend to approach their physical potential earlier then men...

ivyguy wrote:

Regarding Harvard's Pasadyn: I wish her well, but starting college at 16 (with her birthday next month) is hardly unusual. I coached at least one (Ivy) woman, later a Heps champ, in the same situation; my sister-in-law also started at Harvard at 16 (with an October birthday); and I started as a 17-year-old soph at my Ivy, with my birthday in April. Not at all unusual, really (esp. given my soph classmates who were 16 and 15!).

Of course the question is whether an athlete as young as Pasadyn can contribute athletically at a top level before graduating, but then women *do* tend to approach their physical potential earlier then men...

But question is, how much can she contribute as a frosh?

Back to the season:

Cornell and Penn are supposed to be in action today.

Friday, September 7

Cornell with Army & Binghamton — West Point Golf Course (West Point, N.Y.)

La Salle at Penn — Belmont Plateau (Philadelphia, Pa.)

Everyone else will begin their action later this weekend.

Saturday, September 8

Brown and Harvard at the Bryant Invitational — Bryant Campus Course (Smithfield, R.I.)

Dartmouth hosts the Dartmouth Invitational — Hanover Country Club (Hanover, N.H.)

Princeton at the Spiked Shoe Invitational — Blue & White Cross Course (University Park, Pa.)

Yale at the Fordham Fiasco — Van Cortlandt Park (Bronx, N.Y.)

Sunday, September 9

Columbia at the Vermont Invitational — Catamount Family Center (Williston, Vt.)

t7i wrote:

Courtesy of Al Gore's Internet, I have found some info on the Harvard frosh--I'd urge people to accept the PRs listed as only approximate:

MEN

Chris Allen 1:56 4:16 9:05

Malik Epps 1:54 4:19

Billy Gaudreau 1:57 4:11 9:00

Robert Hogg 1:56 4:28

Johnny Marvin 4:22 9:31

Mathew Murray 1:51 4:35

Thomas Purnell 1:53 3:48m 8:11 14:37 [Marks courtesy of "power of 10"--what a great site!]

Konrad Surkont 4:16 9:13

Thanks for putting that together. Looks like 2 Foot Locker finalists for the men, both sub 9:10 3200 guys. Similar to what they got last year. Will be interesting to see what they can do with it. Last year they started out so strong and then imploded - will be watching with interest.

C/M Runner wrote:

But question is, how much can she contribute as a frosh?

Okay, that's reasonable. Based *solely* on what I saw last year--and assuming that she's healthy and fit--I would guess that as a frosh she could well be a top-seven runner for H, and certainly should make their twelve-woman Heps squad easily.

OTOH, with the female talent that the League has returning (and coming in), she would probably have to make one whole step up in class to be truly competitive at the top of the League this year.

So I guess the bottom line is: the way things have been at Harvard, she should be able to contribute to their *team* right away; but more development would be needed for her to make any splash (this year) at Heps.

Cornell men opened at Army (with Binghamton) on Friday:

http://cornellbigred.com/news/2012/9/7/MXC_0907125502.aspx

I was surprised by the magnitude of the Big Red's win over capable squads from USMA and Bing. (Ignore the times, by the way: short course.)

Depth was supposed to be a problem for them this year, but finishing five within 31 seconds (and the first nine within a minute) isn't too bad, particularly given that several of their better runners (no word on injuries) were absent. Some had speculated that freshmen would need to carry some scoring load this year, but CU had no frosh among their top eight in this one.

___

Cornell's women also ran at West Point, over an (apparently legit) 5,000m course:

http://cornellbigred.com/news/2012/9/7/WXC_0907124557.aspx

For the Cornell women, neither the win nor the depth displayed (19 of the first 22 places) was a big surprise. They put three impressively far ahead of Army's Lisa Junta, a quality distance runner (ECAC 10,000m champ).

Only one of CU's highly-touted rookies finished in the Big Red's top eight, but word is that they are deliberately being brought along "gently."

Harvard women win at Nassaney Invitational but Harvard men send only one runner. Wonder what's up with that. Heps Track speculates they must be 'gearing up' for the Harvard Yale meet next weekend. Odd. With the talent on their roster, much 'gearing up' do they need for a dual meet that they literally ran away with last year?

Interesting season-preview video for H at

http://www.gocrimson.com/sports/xc/index

. I give props to J. Saretsky for saying that things didn't turn out the way they wanted last year--and implying that the coaching was at least part of the problem--so changes were in order. Apparently P. Bayley will be coaching the women this fall, with Saretsky focusing on the men.

[Several clips from last year's Heps included--not necessarily the greatest choice by Harvard's sports info department, given the dearth of H jerseys in the lead groups...]

I had also heard that there's been a big restructuring of the t&f staff, following C. Erickson's sudden departure at the end of the summer--had thought that Harvard might try to pick up the throws coach at Cornell (I do wonder how long CU can hold on to her), but apparently a volunteer is taking over Erickson's former duties.

Apologies if this was already posted, but Harvard has posted info about their male and female rookies in cross country:

http://www.gocrimson.com/sports/xc/2012-13/releases/XC120815FreshmanRelease

[So much talent at Harvard--how do the other teams keep them off the podium?]

Interesting to see that the men are "replacing" the departed Billy Orman with another Tuba City guy (who, like Orman, is from the rez but not an Indian)--although Murray is more a mid-distance kid and not likely to be an immediate contributor in cross.

No announcement of t&f recruits yet by Harvard, as near as I can tell.

Columbia men and women were at Vermont today (Sunday) and easily took UVM and St. Michael:

http://uvmathletics.com/news/2012/9/9/CROSS_0909124822.aspx

Columbia men took the first 13 spots; UVM men took the next 13; then the rest (led by J. Gregorek?).

Neer won for the women.

Whoa. Big t&f news (sorry to intrude it into the cross-country thread) on hepstrack.com--finally getting rid of that damned women's 3,000 from the outdoor Heps (as of 2014), but changing lots of other events, as well. The Heps (esp. indoors) are going to look quite different (men's 400/800 will be incredibly cutthroat now) and teams' training/recruiting strategies will change.

Wow! Some changes, including staying at Princeton for xc thru 2013. I'm sad they dropped the indoor 4x800 though, but at least they kept it at outdoor heps.

And yay, xc has begun! I wonder why no Princeton at H-Y though... But hey, only the big invites and heps really matter for xc in my opinion.

C/m runner wrote:

But hey, only the big invites and heps really matter for xc in my opinion.

Sadly, there are a whole lot of people who agree with you (including the foax who decide which teams get into the NCAA meet).

As an athlete and coach, I found that dual (and tri) meets did a lot to foster individual development and team cohesion--they were educational, in other words. I know times change, but I'm sorry to see those meets (mostly) go.