Justyn Knight is the Heavy Favorite over Grant Fisher at NCAA XC, Ednah Kurgat Over Schweizzer
by LetsRun.com
November 17, 2017
Update: 11:09pm 11/17
Voting is still open in the $200,017 NCAA Running Warehouse NCAA XC Prediction Contest, but we’ve crunched the first set of votes from the contest and the LetsRun.com faithful expect some barn burner of races at the NCAA Cross Country Championships in Louisville, Kentucky.
On the men’s side, making sense of the voting is pretty easy. Justyn Knight of Syracuse is the big favorite to win the individual crown over Stanford’s Grant Fisher, while Northern Arizona is the slightest of favorites to retain its team crown over BYU.
On the women’s side, the voting is a bit more complicated. More people think Ednah Kurgat of New Mexico will win the women’s crown than defending champ Karissa Schweizer of Missouri, but Schweizer got more points in voting (that means some people think Kurgat will completely bomb in the race or people left her off the voting). Similarly in the team voting, more people think New Mexico will win the NCAA title than Colorado, but Colorado got more points in the voting than New Mexico, meaning some of you think New Mexico’s 5th runner is going to struggle and New Mexico might slip down the standings out of the top two.
Update: On the women’s side, Ednah Kurgat of New Mexico is the slight favorite over defending champ Karissa Schweizer of Missouri, and the New Mexico women are slight favorites over Colorado.
Detailed vote tallies below:
| LetsRun.com Men’s Super Poll Results | ||
| 1. | Northern Arizona (258) | 5066 |
| 2. | BYU (256) | 5054 |
| 3. | Syracuse (19) | 3794 |
| 4. | Stanford (3) | 3223 |
| 5. | Portland (1) | 3058 |
| 6. | Colorado (4) | 2950 |
| 7. | Furman | 1298 |
| 8. | Colorado St. | 864 |
| 9. | Oregon (1) | 760 |
| 10. | Arkansas | 741 |
| 11. | Michigan | 487 |
| 12. | Southern Utah | 338 |
| 13. | Alabama | 320 |
| 14. | Oklahoma State | 258 |
| 15. | Virginia Tech | 246 |
| 16. | Iowa State | 234 |
| 17. | Washington | 221 |
| 18. | Iona | 215 |
| 19. | Michigan State | 135 |
| 20. | Ole Miss | 104 |
Others receiving votes: 21. Boise State 70 22. Texas 66 23. UCLA 65 24. Air Force 64 25. Utah State 60 26. NC State 60 27. Mid. Tenn. State 52 28. Princeton 49 29. Navy 31 30. Virginia 26 31. Washington St. 11
LRC Comment: As exepcted a tight two team battle between NAU and BYU.
| 1. | Justyn Knight (369) – Syracuse | 4596 | |
| 2. | Grant Fisher (73) – Stanford | 3892 | |
| 3. | Rory Linkletter (3) – BYU | 2439 | |
| 4. | Vincent Kiprop (14) – Alabama | 2017 | |
| 5. | Gilbert Kigen (9) – Alabama | 1848 | |
| 6. | Joe Klecker – Colorado | 1553 | |
| 7. | Alfred Chelanga (4) – Alabama | 1280 | |
| 8. | Matthew Baxter (1) – Northern Arizona | 1043 | |
| 9. | Tyler Day – Northern Arizona | 973 | |
| 10. | Jacob Choge (1) – Mid. Tenn. State | 900 | |
| 11. | Emmanuel Rotich (4) – Tulane | 825 | |
| 12. | Andy Trouard – Northern Arizona | 742 | |
| 13. | Casey Clinger (2) – BYU | 451 | |
| 14. | Connor McMillan – BYU | 380 | |
| 15. | Amon Kemboi – Campbell | 369 | |
| 16. | Emmanuel Roudolff-Levisse (2) – Portland | 283 | |
| 17. | Grant Fischer (2) – Colorado St. | 279 | |
| 18. | Colin Bennie – Syracuse | 261 | |
| 19. | Ben Flanagan – Michigan | 242 | |
| 20. | Jonathan Green (1) – Georgetown | 219 | |
| Others receiving votes: 21. Lawrence Kipkoech (Campbell) 158 22. Jerrell Mock (Colorado St.) 155 23. Hassan Abdi (Oklahoma State) 154 24. Clayton Young (BYU) 152 25. Jack Bruce (Arkansas) 142 26. Josh Kerr (New Mexico) 135 27. Jonathan Davis (Illinois) 131 28. Dillon Maggard (Utah State) 88 29. Jeff Thies (Portland) 81 30. Oliver Hoare (Wisconsin) 76 31. Alex George (Arkansas) 66 32. Edwin Kurgat (Tennessee-Martin) 63 33. Kigen Chemadi (Mid. Tenn. State) 55 34. Azaria Kirwa (Liberty) 52 35. Zach Perrin (Colorado) 46 36. Other () 46 37. Ben Veatch (Indiana) 37 38. Colby Gilbert (Washington) 33 39. Aidan Tooker (Syracuse) 33 40. Casey Comber (Villanova) 32 41. Tanner Anderson (Oregon) 29 42. Nick Hauger (Portland) 29 43. Brian Barraza (Houston) 27 44. Aaron Templeton (Furman) 25 45. Andrew Gardner (Washington) 23 46. Joe Hardy (Wisconsin) 23 47. Hlynur Andresson (Eastern Michigan) 23 48. Austen Dalquist (Arkansas) 19 49. Dan Curts (Iowa State) 19 50. Paul Hogan (UMass Lowell) 18 51. Conor Lundy (Princeton) 15 52. Andrew Jordan (Iowa State) 15 53. Johannes Motschmann (Iona) 14 54. Steven Fahy (Stanford) 13 55. Brent Demarest (Virginia) 13 56. Arsène Guillorel (Samford) 13 57. Bryce Miller (UMKC) 13 58. Philo Germano (Syracuse) 13 59. Mickey Davey (Air Force) 11 60. Sean Tobin (Ole Miss) 11 61. Andy Snyder (Washington) 8 62. Miler Haller (Boise State) 8 63. Clark Ruiz (Michigan State) 8 64. Lachlan Cook (Virginia) 8 65. Christian Farris (Texas A&M) 8 66. Timothy McGowan (Penn State) 7 67. Patrick Reilly (Lehigh) 7 68. Jon Bishop (Texas A&M) 7 69. Connor Mora (Michigan) 6 70. Nahom Solomon (Georgia Tech) 6 71. Andrew Marston (Villanova) 5 72. Paul Luevano (Boston U.) 4 73. Alex Rogers (Texas) 3 74. Nadeel Wildschutt (Coastal Carolina) 2 75. Taylor FloydMews (Bradley) 2 76. Troy Reeder (Furman) 2 77. Swarnjit Boyal (Cal Poly) 1 | |||
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LRC Comment: Justyn Knight is the bigger favorite than we thought he’d be.
Knight has only lost one cross country race since the start of 2016
| LetsRun.com Women’s Super Poll Results | ||
| 1. | New Mexico (250) | 4680 |
| 2. | Colorado (219) | 4662 |
| 3. | Oregon (18) | 3539 |
| 4. | San Francisco (26) | 3518 |
| 5. | Stanford (3) | 2952 |
| 6. | NC State (1) | 1827 |
| 7. | Arkansas (3) | 1695 |
| 8. | Michigan | 1479 |
| 9. | Providence (1) | 865 |
| 10. | Boise State | 724 |
| 11. | Furman | 429 |
| 12. | Penn State | 325 |
| 13. | Villanova | 321 |
| 14. | BYU (1) | 255 |
| 15. | Michigan State (1) | 233 |
| 16. | Iowa State (2) | 224 |
| 17. | Washington | 185 |
| 18. | Wisconsin | 159 |
| 19. | California | 109 |
| 20. | Oklahoma State | 109 |
Others receiving votes: 21. Syracuse 85 22. Utah State 85 23. Minnesota 72 24. Ole Miss 59 25. Columbia 52 26. Indiana 49 27. Georgia 46 28. Dartmouth 37 29. Texas 35 30. Eastern Kentucky 34 31. Eastern Michigan 31
LRC Comment: New Mexico now leads in first place votes and total points.
| 1. | Ednah Kurgat (214) – New Mexico | 3685 | |
| 2. | Karissa Schweizer (136) – Missouri | 3664 | |
| 3. | Elinor Purrier (40) – New Hampshire | 2787 | |
| 4. | Allie Ostrander (19) – Boise State | 2418 | |
| 5. | Charlotte Taylor (7) – San Francisco | 2174 | |
| 6. | Dani Jones (15) – Colorado | 2097 | |
| 7. | Katie Rainsberger (4) – Oregon | 1808 | |
| 8. | Alice Wright (2) – New Mexico | 668 | |
| 9. | Grayson Murphy (1) – Utah | 631 | |
| 10. | Weini Kelati – New Mexico | 600 | |
| 11. | Sharon Lokedi (1) – Kansas | 366 | |
| 12. | Amy-Eloise Neale – Washington | 298 | |
| 13. | Katherine Receveur – Indiana | 253 | |
| 14. | Caroline Sang (1) – Charlotte | 243 | |
| 15. | Weronika Pyzik – San Francisco | 237 | |
| 16. | Charlotte Prouse – New Mexico | 235 | |
| 17. | Allie Buchalski – Furman | 232 | |
| 18. | Elise Cranny – Stanford | 172 | |
| 19. | Paige Stoner – Syracuse | 151 | |
| 20. | Bella Burda – Villanova | 150 | |
| Others receiving votes: 21. Nikki Hiltz (Arkansas) 142 22. Samantha Drop (Georgia) 141 23. Karisa Nelson (Samford) 108 24. Other () 84 25. Gina Sereno (Michigan) 78 26. Vanessa Fraser (Stanford) 73 27. Taylor Werner (Arkansas) 63 28. Makena Morley (Colorado) 59 29. Bethan Knights (California) 58 30. Winny Koech (UTEP) 49 31. Catarina Rocha (Providence) 46 32. Sarah Disanza (Wisconsin) 45 33. Carina Viljoen (Arkansas) 40 34. Jessica Drop (Georgia) 33 35. Isabelle Brauer (San Francisco) 33 36. Alison Willingmyre (Penn State) 31 37. Purity Sanga (Tennessee Tech) 28 38. Lilli Burdon (Oregon) 26 39. Brenda Kigen (Auburn) 23 40. Paige Gilchrist (Northern Arizona) 23 41. Shelby Brown (Ole Miss) 22 42. Christine Bendzinski (Bucknell) 22 43. Brianna Ilarda (Providence) 21 44. Jamie Morrissey (Michigan) 21 45. Alexandra Lucki (Maryland) 21 46. Aubrey Roberts (Northwestern) 19 47. Gabrielle Forrest (Princeton) 19 48. Alexandria Hackett (Abilene Christian) 19 49. Laura Young (BYU) 18 50. Dominique Clairmonte (North Carolina St.) 18 51. Bethany Hasz (Minnesota) 17 52. Anna West (Baylor) 15 53. Heather MacLean (UMass Amherst) 14 54. Therese Haiss (Arkansas) 14 55. Maggie Farrell (Michigan State) 13 56. Charlotte Imer (Eastern Kentucky) 13 57. Egle Morenaite (Iona) 12 58. Bethlehem Taye (North Carolina St.) 11 59. Eden Meyer (North Florida) 10 60. Shannon Malone (Syracuse) 10 61. Greta Lindsley (Penn State) 10 62. Danae Rivers (Penn State) 9 63. Cailie Logue (Iowa State) 8 64. Jordann McDermitt (Eastern Michigan) 7 65. Jenica Dodge (Idaho State) 7 66. Dorcas Wasike (Louisville) 7 67. Jeralyn Poe (Michigan State) 6 68. Jaci Smith (Air Force) 6 69. Erin Gregoire (Columbia) 5 70. Megan Hasz (Minnesota) 5 71. Martha MacDonald (Georgetown) 5 72. Frances Schmiede (Virginia) 4 73. Jillian Hunsberger (Penn State) 3 74. Lindsey Bradley (Baylor) 3 75. Elly Henes (North Carolina St.) 3 76. Madeline Strandemo (Minnesota) 2 77. Michaela Hackett (Abilene Christian) 2 78. Hannah Miller (SMU) 2 | |||
| LetsRun.com Women’s NCAA Picks | |
| Ednah Kurgat | 48.1 % |
| Karissa Schweizer | 30.6 % |
| Elinor Purrier | 8.9 % |
| Allie Ostrander | 4.3 % |
| Dani Jones | 3.4 % |
| Charlotte Taylor | 1.6 % |
| Katie Rainsberger | 0.9 % |
| Alice Wright | 0.4 % |
| Samantha Drop | 0.2 % |
| Grayson Murphy | 0.2 % |
| Others | 1.3 % |
LRC Comment: Kurgat is your favorite.