D2 East XC Thread

Weekly Ranking 9/30

http://www.ustfccca.org/2014/09/featured/regional-team-rankings-in-division-ii-xc-hold-relatively-steady

1. AIC (Holds #14 Nationally)

2. FP (Drops down to #23 Nationally this week)

3. Stonehill

4. RW

5. Bentley (bumps Merrimack after they had a weak performance over the weekend)

AIC. FP and Stonehill all running at Paul Short on Saturday - will get our first look at how they "stack" up on the same course. RW & Bentley are also running at Louisville Invite (site of D2 Nationals)so we can see far the "gap" is in the East from #4 to # 5.

Who ya got for top 10 individuals?

hi wrote:

Who ya got for top 10 individuals?

First Blush - but much can change over the next month:

Biwott - AIC

Chirchir - AIC

Fiermonte- Assumption

Filappazzo - Adelphi

Smith - Franklin Pierce

Zawalich - Stonehill

Gisore - Franklin Pierce

Brown - RW

Fontanella - Stonehill

Rodgers - RW

nexctrackfan wrote:

EAST Region Poll from 9/24 - (3 auto quals)

1 AIC Northeast-10

2 Franklin Pierce Northeast-10

3 Stonehill Northeast-10

4 Roberts Wesleyan East Coast

5 Merrimack Northeast-10

Top three were off this past weekend (all are at Paul Short next week). RW ran well in their home meet - taking third behind D1 Cortland St (NY) and Cornell,with just about a 60 second spread 1-5, will need to tighten that up before November.

Merrimack proved that this is clearly a four horse race for 3 national spots as they only finished 3rd in a "very" weak CodFish Bowl meet at Franklin Park.

Cortland is D3 and not nationally ranked so that's slightly less impressive, IMO.

How are things looking after this weekend? Any big moves after Paul Short? Did anyone important race anywhere else?

Bentley raced down at Louisville this past weekend.

Nik Haas - 26:09

Cullen McHale - 26:33

David Cooper - 26:48

Rupak Mehta - 26:50

Erik Alatalo - 27:17

Anthony Lacey - 27:33

Mac Segura-Cook - 27:40

And just for fun comparison... here's what Bentley did the last time they went to Louisville (2010) along with what they subsequently ran at Regionals for 10k six weeks later.

Rob Dextradeur - 25:17 - 32:38

John Drago - 25:43 - 32:57

Craig Robinson - 25:45 - 33:03

Curtis Trueb - 26:00 - 32:35

Bryan Sutherland - 26:07 - n/a

Sean Reagan - 26:14 - 33:06

Steve Gendron - 26:19 - 32:43

Teddy Farley - 26:20 - 32:07

It's definitely not a slow course, but it's not quite as fast as, say, Umass Dartmouth, and is definitely faster than Franklin Park.

Mike Mahon wrote:

Bentley raced down at Louisville this past weekend.

Nik Haas - 26:09

Cullen McHale - 26:33

David Cooper - 26:48

Rupak Mehta - 26:50

Erik Alatalo - 27:17

Anthony Lacey - 27:33

Mac Segura-Cook - 27:40

RW also raced down in Louisville and if FP does not get the back end of their scorers squared away by next week the top three coming out of the east will be really easy to pick - AIC/Stonehill/RW.

Here is what RW did:

Brown 25;34

Rodgers 25:44

Bender 25:53

Watson 26:04

Pease 26:17

43 second 1-5 split

You are aware that NCAA regionals are over six weeks away, right? None of these teams will be able to prove anything until that day and I doubt any experienced team will be giving up or celebrating in the first week of October.

Is that science? wrote:

You are aware that NCAA regionals are over six weeks away, right? None of these teams will be able to prove anything until that day and I doubt any experienced team will be giving up or celebrating in the first week of October.

Good catch Is that Science - I meant next month/not next week!

Don't remember anything in my last note talking about celebrating - just stating that a team needs to get their 4 and 5 runners closer to the top 3 to compete for a Natioanl spot.

Pace, Teikyo Post, or Bridgeport FTW

So... Biwott?

Yea, Biwott is decent

Regular season is now over (CACC is 11/2), and Dooley nor Stasiuk have shown up in results anywhere.

Where does this leave the women's individual title? Will one of these femme fatales win it all?

Jerotich? Prutsman? Williams?

Conference weekend is come and gone, who are the pretenders and the real deal (AIC!)?

ne10watcher wrote:

Conference weekend is come and gone, who are the pretenders and the real deal (AIC!)?

Conference weekend HAS come and gone...

AIC buys another title, stop the presses!

ESL wrote:

ne10watcher wrote:

Conference weekend is come and gone, who are the pretenders and the real deal (AIC!)?

Conference weekend HAS come and gone...

AIC buys another title, stop the presses!

Actually I believe it is their first - but I do understand your point - I think?

2 Kenyans, a Brit, a Mick and 2 transfers make up their top 6-but hey they are supporting their name - AIC - American International College

Again, Stonehill shows their lack of class. Give AIC their credit. 6 in the top 8 was amazing. They are well coached.

Predictions for regionals-

1 )AIC- Team is too good! Is this their year? I think so! They completely owned the entire NE10.

2) Stonehill- Seems to have the same great depth and low spread that they do each and every year. Great to have that at the conference/regional level. Had some youngsters up there this weekend too!

3) Franklin Pierce- Can't imagine they could run much worse than they did at NE10's and got 3rd. Perhaps Gisore or Smith will perform better on the flatter mines falls course, but even if they don't they still should get 3rd.

4) Bentley- Well coached, always does better at the end of the season. Good showing this past weekend. This team is young and fast improving.

5) Robert Wes- Reminds me of Stonehill, but with a slower pack. Hard to tell looking at results if they are getting faster or slower than they were in September.

I think RW takes third spot if FP's 4th and 5th runners (behind Gisore/Smith/Ham) falter. Also, still not convinced that FP and Stonehill ran anything more than a hard workout yesterday. Why run any harder? They were not going to beat AIC this year and they want to be ready for East Regional on the 21st.