It’s been two years since the Big West last held a cross country championship, but the action should be hot in Davis this Friday. The team race is looking like a Poly-Santa Barbara duel, but the mid pack action should be pretty solid. Here are my rankings leading into the race.
1. Santa Barbara. Nick Randazzo should win handily. The Dazzler looked great on the course in September, easily taking down Poly’s Jake Ritter, and he smashed the field at Santa Clara. Can the Gauchos’ 4 and 5 guys close the gap enough on Cal Poly? Brian Shulz nearly brought the house down in this spring’s 10k, will he rise to the occasion? They are consistently good, although they don’t have much success at the regional level in recent years. They lost to Poly by 5 points at Bronco, and have too big of a gap from 3 to 4, but I’m going to say it: they’re going to win on Friday
2. Cal Poly. Almost impossible to bet against them, although losing Ritter to injury has definitely lowered the ceiling on their potential this year. Without him, they don’t seem to have a true #1, they just have a lot of good dudes. This team seems to vacuum up all the 9:15 guys from California, and every year they are a consistently solid team. It’s going to be super close this Friday, but I think their reign atop the conference will end this year. Come regionals, will they run better than the last few years? It would be fun to see.
3. Fullerton. Sam Ayala is a stud and should give the Dazzler a run for his money for the title. They have a strong front three, but in Riverside last week they had a 30-position gap between their third and fourth scorers. That might not be as much of an issue in a smaller race, but it’s still a concern. They got second two years ago, but third is where they fit this year.
4. UC Davis. They’ve been a little hot and cold this year. But if they can have a good day at the right time, they might be able to pip Fullerton for the last podium spot. Austin Vasquez has popped out of the pack this year. Can he break into the top five in the conference, and do the Aggies have the ability to back him up? Ryman Crone broke out in track season, but he’s been on the comeback trail this fall. It’s their home course, so we’ll see if it gives them the advantage they’re looking for.
5. Long Beach State. They ran pretty solid last week at Riverside, finishing within a stone’s throw of UCLA but well back of Fullerton. Beach is a classic midpack team in the conference, but maybe they’ll get a boost by their new Nike uniforms and find some jets. I think this is a pretty comfortable place for the people with the giant pyramid on campus.
6. CSUN. I’m not sure how much putting CSUN in sixth is them getting better or UCR and UCI just getting worse. They actually have quite a solid top three, but their fifth guy finished in 210th or something at Riverside. If they can solve that problem in the coming years there’s no reason why they can’t make the jump to joining the fight for fourth and fifth. CSUN, Riverside, and Irvine were within 25 points two weeks ago, so flip a coin to choose who wins the battle for sixth.
7. UC Riverside. The Highlanders had a dirty 1-2 two years ago, both of whom finished in the top five at home at conference. But now they’re both gone, and there isn’t anyone to fill that gap. They held off Davis on the strength of those low sticks, but unfortunately this is a lean year in Riverside. CSUN beat them by five points two weeks ago, but a much smaller meet will mitigate the CSUN’s ginormous holes.
8. UC Irvine. Well, they lost the fight two weeks ago at Riverside, so this is where I’m putting them. I honestly don’t know that much about this team other than the fact that I can’t decide if their uniforms are cool or ugly. It might be a tough one out there for them, but they also might do enough to move up two spots, we’ll see.