2008 DIII XC

I basing my analysis only on regional results, since I don't know enough about most teams to do much else. As a result, I'm sure that some team that underperformed at regionals will mess up my predictions.

I don't see any real contenders in the South/West/Central regions with Nebraska Wesleyan being the best of that group but too much of a spread behind someone who only finished 7th in his region.

Obviously Cortland in the Atlantic is great, NYU's spread looks a bit large for them to be contenders. Cortland looks really tough to beat, but there is some vulnerability after the first 3 that might allow them to be beaten by a team that maybe loses at positions 2-3 but wins at 4-5. Maybe.

Carnegie Mellon from the Mideast and Williams from the NE look like very similar teams. Slight advantage to Williams b/c I think Kosgey is better and they have a slightly tighter 2-4 spread.

Calvin also looks sick but with a 5th guy that far back at nationals they will score too many points to win it all.

MW- North Central are the favorites in my opinion. That's a disgusting 1-7 spread. LaCrosse is also really strong. Steven's Point's 3-5 are too far back to contend.

Predictions:

North Central

LaCrosse

Cortland

Williams

Calvin

Carnegie Mellon

Steven's Point

The Rest

Individuals:

Not sure on this, but I think NE is underestimated. Faller was 6th at DI New Englands (Holtschulte was 3rd the year he won nationals), and is mixing it up with Kosgey, Norte, and a few others. I expect a greater than usual number of AA from NE.

Should be fun!

you seem to be a little too high on new england. other than faller, kosgey and norte, how many all americans do you really see them getting? also, williams as the 4th team? They haven't stepped it up at nationals in years.

As always, "the letter why," I give a lot of respect to someone who's willing to make specific predictions and who has some reason (besides the school that s/he attends!) for making them.

I think your analysis/prediction, based on the info you have, is pretty reasonable. What I was *told* was that Cortland held out its #1 and #2 runners from Regionals. If that's true (I'm not going to go through a season's worth of results to figure it out), it's just scary. They're still my pick FTW, but I don't see a runaway (and I agree that NCC is looking a lot like the school's teams of old).

In addition (partisan as usual), I think my hometown Violets will do a little better than be among "the rest"--in their conference meet NYU handled CMU (your sixth pick) pretty well. There could also be two more Atlantic Region teams in the top 12-15.

Strangely enough, I no longer pick Hamilton's Kosgei as the *prohibitive* favorite for the individual win. Yes, if I were forced to bet, my money would still be on him; but I think he's now slightly vulnerable to the kind of race he got last year, though there are only a few guys with even the possibility of racing him even-up throughout. I'm one of the people who thinks teams don't race enough nowadays, but paradoxically I think he may have had one or two *too* many races. OTOH if he was just cruising to some of those wins, he'll be truly untouchable!

I agree with you on the main thing: should be fun! I think a lot of the places, including a trophy or two, could be decided by a handful of points--below the very top, a *lot* of teams seem evenly matched.

They haven't had a team this good in years. 3 AA is more than NE has been getting, and I think all of those guys are top 15 types (maybe not Norte). It's possible no one else gets AA, but I expect the next 2 Williams guys to be right there. And 5 IS good for a region that hasn't had great individuals for awhile. I'm just arguing that that's not so true this year. Maybe I'm wrong. We'll see.

If that were true about Cortland, then obviously I would move them up to first, but I don't think it is. Those top 3 have been their 3 all season and the 4-5 are the same as well. So I'll stick to my guns.

Cortland -- Rested two possible top 5 runners at Regionals and still won easily on a sloppy course. (Probably 20-25 seconds slow I would guess) Henry, Nally and DuBois will all be competing for top 10-15 at NCAAs. If Wager can get back to early season racing, he will be right there with them. Their 5th right now is a little suspect, but expect someone, whether it be O'Brien, Scrafford, Greenlaw, DeRusso, Stermer, etc... to have a big race at NCAAs

NCC -- Don't know much about them but they have been strong all year. Regional results were very impressive. Race could be close, but I don't see them beating Cortland.

NYU -- Did not run particularly well at Regionals, but still got an Auto Qualifier. Schneider will be in contention for top 5 at NCAAs. If Turlip runs well, they should be looking at a podium position.

The final podium position is up for grabs by a bunch a teams. In no particular order:

LaCrosse, Geneseo, Stevens Point, Calvin

I looked at some past nationals results, and I think I'm going to defend my pick of Williams (who I feel has been HIGHLY underestimated on this thread).

Kosgey is very underrated and I have seen him in very few top-10 picks. However, Faller is better than last year, Kosgey has not lost to him and Faller was 18th last year. I put Kosgey around 10th, possibly a little higher.

Perlis and Christian are around 20 seconds behind him. Looking at the last 3 years' results, this would put them between 25-35.

Chaffee and Raduazo are about 15 seconds behind that, which is between 45-55.

That puts Williams between 150-190 points, which is a podium team any year.

*Actually, I forgot to take out individuals in this, so that gives me even more leeway here. Based just on 2005, they would average 10 scoring places or more faster. That's 100-140 or so, which is good for top 2 most years.

You can argue that I overestimated their guys, but I only picked them for 4th. I think they'll be a surprise to many, but shouldn't be after dominating NE regional.

while north central has a very strong pack and is a serious threat the reality of it is cortland when firing all pistons can put there top 5 under 25. With their top 3 all capable of 24:30 or faster. North centrals pack is great and if cortland faulters will be there to win but as always it'll come down to race day and that 4th and 5th man on cortlands squad

I was at the Atlantic regionals Saturday. In refernce to Cortland's efforts at regionals, they ran a full squad, hard. They rested no one and did not hold back. I agree they are the best, but are VERY beatble, and I think if they run the way they did at regionals, they will be beat. Nally always steps it up at nationals, so that's a good sign for them. Should be intersting.

Wrong. I was there and I can say with 100% confidence they held out their current 5th and 7th runners from their conference meet results. Look at the results. The shit people come up with on these forums.

smz2 wrote:

I was at the Atlantic regionals Saturday. In refernce to Cortland's efforts at regionals, they ran a full squad, hard. They rested no one and did not hold back. I agree they are the best, but are VERY beatble, and I think if they run the way they did at regionals, they will be beat. Nally always steps it up at nationals, so that's a good sign for them. Should be intersting.

Cortland did not run a full squad at Regionals.

Look back to their conference meet and you will see that Scrafford (5th, and improving all year long) and O'Brien (7th) did not run at Regionals.

It also seemed the last mile that Nally, DuBois and Henry packed it up, as evidenced by their times all within one second of each other. If Wager runs well at NCAAs, as I have already said, he will be right there with, or ahead of his teammates. If that does happen, we could see 4 in the top 15 or 20 for Cortland, which no other team can touch.

Then why do you pick him again if you think so? why don't you if you don't know how he's been racing? a few days and we'll see.

if u want to be really exact, yes they did, but they ran 2 other guys that are pretty much the same ability level resulting in no net difference- if they held out their 1&3 or 2&4 i would say different story, but not this case

There is a simple stat more important than pack spread that everyone is overlooking....ratio of balls / body mass. Spain wins going away, the rest of the NCC pack skips in for the win holding hands with b-mull...kaul drops out because he is bored but discloses later via press release that he could have won if he wanted to. Kosgie gets 4, making his move from 163rd place at 7k. Cortland holds out their 1,3,5&7 to finish 2...the rest of their guys they are saving for track, so f-ing watch out. WIAC rounds out the top five...and the South region teams all tie for last.

quote]FastPat wrote:

There is a simple stat more important than pack spread that everyone is overlooking....ratio of balls / body mass. Spain wins going away, the rest of the NCC pack skips in for the win holding hands with b-mull...kaul drops out because he is bored but discloses later via press release that he could have won if he wanted to. Kosgie gets 4, making his move from 163rd place at 7k. Cortland holds out their 1,3,5&7 to finish 2...the rest of their guys they are saving for track, so f-ing watch out. WIAC rounds out the top five...and the South region teams all tie for last.[/quote]

What the heck are you talking about?

your attempt at humor failed

no blow??

I've run against Lacrosse, NYU, Calvin and some of the other contenders for the title. Out of all of them, I would say Calvin is the toughest, then Lacrosee, then NYU.

I think it will be very close between Cortland and NCC. Cortland has the front runners but NCC has the pack if NCC can get a guy up with their front runners it will be close. Calvin, UWLAX, and Point will be battling for the the other two trophies. Should be a great race to see!