Ivy Cross Country Heps 2022

I'm confused. Why couldn't Heps and Regionals both be at VCP?

I guess they could but didn’t know if that would happen. So columbia is the host this year? If so, Ivy teams should have an advantage after seeing it 2 weeks prior.

source for the regionals being at VCP? I thought it was going to be at Franklin Park for the next few years.

If you look at any school in the northeast that's updated their 2022 XC schedule, you'll see the regional meet is at VCP. Alternatively, you can go to the USTFCCCA site and look at the future meet schedule, it's listed as NY,NY and hosted by Columbia.

You're not the one who's confused, 2 weeks should be enough time to clear the hungover Dartmouth guys off the course in time for regionals!

haha. dartmouth had a tough go of it in 2019 at VCP for heps.

couldn't be a more different team now, though. new coach, new lineup. whether they follow the dartmouth cross county legacy of "crush beers and train like an animal" or not, they'll certainly be performing better than they did last time

They've got the first half down for sure

care to elaborate? seems like they had a solid xc season last year and had a lot of depth and a couple "front runners" in indoor and outdoor

I'm a rising freshman at a school similar academically and ranked similarly but think I may want to transfer - if I have the times, do you know if the coaches have the same "pull" as in freshman admissions?

Let's take a look at the top 15 returners from last year's Heps
XC meet, alongside their track prs.

1 - Acer Iverson (Harvard, 13:28 5k, 28:23 10k)
2 - Graham Blanks (Harvard, 13:27)
3 - Anthony Monte (Princeton, 13:50i, 28:56)
4 - Matthew Farrell (Princeton, 13:55i, 29:20)
5 - Tyler Berg (Columbia, 13:49i. 28:55)
6 - Nicholas Bendtsen (Princeton, 13:44, 4:00 mile)
7 - Joshua Zelek (Princeton, 13:58, 29:05)
8 - Jarrett Kirk (Princeton, 14:11)
9 - Ben Hartvigsen (Harvard, 14:14, 29:13)
10 - Zubeir Dagane (Penn, 14:05, 29:53, 3:43 1500)
11 - Michael Keehan (Penn, 8:47 3ksc)
12 - Connor Nisbet (Princeton, 14:00)
13 - David Melville (Harvard, 13:49i, 29:00)
14 - Oliver Stewart (Penn, 8:57 3ksc)
15 - Perry Mackinnon (Cornell, 13:46, 29:11)

That's 6 from Princeton, 4 from Harvard, 3 from Penn, and 1 each from
Cornell and Columbia. Pretty unsurprising distribution, in terms of what we've
come to expect from the league the past several years. Princeton clearly has
better depth than the rest of the teams, though it's worth noting their
home-course advantage at last year’s meet. Harvard has the obvious firepower up
front between Iverson and Blanks, but their 3-4 are more on par with the backend
of Princeton’s projected top returners. The low sticks help them out at the NCAA
meet (where they finished 12th as one of only 4 teams with 3+ All-Americans—the
other 3 teams all ending up on the podium) but haven’t been enough to get the team
win in a less deep meet like the Heps. But if their 3-4 progress and they can
find a solid #5 (perhaps incoming 3:38 Luxembourger freshman Vivien Henz, or
3:58 miler Joe Ewing?), they could improve upon their NCAA finish and give Princeton
a run for its money at the conference meet. But until that comes to pass, Princeton
is historically the safest guess for the Ivy team title.

In terms of individuals, betting money would have to be on Iverson to win,
after sweeping the distance titles at Heps both indoor and outdoor. Blanks had
an abbreviated outdoor season after being sidelined by an Achilles injury indoors, but if he can return to his 13:27/23rd at NCAA XC form, he would obviously be a
contender as well. Or it could be someone else; people tend to come out of the
woodwork. Last year’s top 3 (who have all since graduated) were each somewhat unexpected in their own right. Prior to winning last year’s meet, Matthew Pereira’s highest
finish at a Heps XC was 12th. Ed Trippas, who was 2nd, had only been 13th, and Kevin Berry improved from a best finish of 53rd to 3rd.

Runners worth bringing into the conversation, outside of the aforementioned top
returners from the 2021 XC Heps meet? Will Daley from Dartmouth was a DNF at last
year’s XC Heps, but has run 13:57 since then and anchored Dartmouth’s winning
DMR at Indoor Heps. Rishabh Prakash from Cornell ran 13:51 and was 5th in the indoor Heps 3k. Camren Fischer and Daniel O’Brien from Princeton didn’t compete in the fall,
but Fischer is a stud if healthy, winning the Mid-Atlantic Regional his
freshman year and running 3:58/7:59 indoors; and O’Brien ran 13:56 this spring and scored in the Heps mile in the winter. Yale’s Stephen Moody is inconsistent, but did run 13:58 at Raleigh Relays. Dylan Throop from Penn just made the USA U20 team in the 5000. Or maybe
one of the conference’s milers puts it together on the grass: Cornell’s Rhys
Hammond (NCAA 1500 qualifier) and Damien Hackett (3:41 1500), Princeton’s
Harrison Witt (Indoor Heps 1000m champion) and Duncan Miller (3:57 mile), Columbia’s
Michael Danzi (3:42 1500, 2nd at Heps in both 1500 and mile).

It appears several of the teams in the league have contingents out at
altitude, as well. Harvard seems to be in Flagstaff. Princeton is in Park City.
And Cornell and Columbia are in Boulder. Whether the same is true for Penn, Dartmouth,
Yale, and Brown, I can’t say.

This is good analysis. I think Harvard is the better team nationally. Princeton seems to just gear up for Heps and then they are done at nationals. Seems like a strange strategy and what recruit would be down with that? I guess they just have so many slots. Harvard talent is getting into the top 10 - 5 nationally. The kid from Luxembourg could make an impact.

Harvard does seem to have figured out some secret to NCAA XC that Princeton hasn't, finishing 12th and 15th in their two most recent appearances, both after losing the Heps meet (and frankly underperforming there). The gulf that seems to exist between their 2-3 All-American caliber runners and the rest of their team each year is slightly baffling though. Gibby's training seems to work very well when it works (I'd argue you can't get someone to run 27:45 for 10k without being a very good distance coach), but that doesn't seem to be the case for all his runners. And not to diminish the role of his coaching, but there was some luck and talent involved in Blanks running 13:27 a year out of high school. Anybody who says they saw that meteoric rise coming is lying.
Princeton, to their credit, has also been competitive nationally, but more on the track than in xc. Trippas and Lundy are their best finishers at NCAA XC in recent memory, and neither placed higher than the 60s -- despite both garnering All-American honors at outdoor NCAAs during their tenure (Lundy earning 2nd team in the 5k and Trippas 1st team in the 3k steeple). And Princeton was 5th as a team at NCAA indoor and 7th at NCAA outdoor this past year, with distance 1st team All-Americans in the 800, 1500, 3ksc, and DMR. Vig has always been known as more of a middle distance coach -- Manzano, Andrews -- and that clearly remains his specialty. But Princeton even had 5 entries at Regionals in the 10k, which was the most of any team in the East besides Notre Dame's 6. Yet they had 0 qualifiers to NCAAs in that event, compared to Harvard's 2 of 3 entered (or Notre Dame's 4 of 6). Princeton's weakness to now is that they haven't had anyone emerge as a legitimate longer distance low stick or cross country All-American in the way that Harvard has.

Nick Bendtsen of Princeton HAS to be in the convo as well (4:00 mile indoor, 13:45 5000 outdoors as a true freshman)

Well, we know it won't be Dartmouth!

Likely more a training difference than strategy/philosophy difference. 10K is not the same as 8K.

In the first real week of competition, Princeton takes down Harvard 29-31 at HYP. looks like both teams ran a full squad, with Harvard going 1-3-6-7-14 and Princeton going 2-4-5-8-10. At any rate, a very close race. In usual fashion Harvard looks stronger up front but Princeton seems to have more depth. Should be an interesting season.

Also after Penn, Columbia, Dartmouth, Cornell, and Yale ran their squads today, it does not look like anyone else will be challenging for the 1-2 spots this year.

I was at VCP today and word was that Cornell was having its "big" guys just do a workout.

Harvard didn’t run as many as Princeton or Yale. Big for them to have Blanks back and the Luxembourg freshman will make an impact this year it seems. Heps should be great this year

columbia only ran mid d guys