The Georgetown cross country program was successful at the Big East Championships this past Friday in Boston. Both the men’s and women’s team came away with second place finishes. The men’s team trailed only six points behind Providence’s 52 while the women’s team scored 68 points, second also to Providence’s 39.
Junior Matt Debole led the team in the men’s 8K race, finishing fifth overall with a time of 23:35. He finished in a pack of runners 2-6 who crossed the line within 11 seconds of each other.
“There are some great individuals in the Big East, and I feel like I can race and compete with any one of them,” Debole said.
Redshirt freshman Levi Miller placed seventh in the race with a time of 23:45. Another redshirt freshman, Andrew Bumbalough, finished in 23:57 to take 11th place, and junior Michael Banks came in 14th, crossing the line in 24:14. The team scored its last points with junior Justin Scheid, who came in 21st, running 24:20.
The men went into the race ranked No. 16 in the U.S. Track & Field Cross Country Coaching Association (USTFCCCA) national poll. They fell to No. 20 Providence and upset No. 12 Notre Dame. The Hoya men secured a runner-up finish for a third straight time and the 15th time in their history.
The women ranked No. 18 in the USTFCCCA poll prior to the race but have moved up to No. 15. The No. 12 Friars were the only team that out-ran Georgetown, as the Hoyas took home their eighth runner-up finish in the Big East.
“Big East is an important meet for us, we definitely went into the race with winning in the back of our minds,” senior Elizabeth Maloy wrote in an email.
Maloy placed third in the 6K race and first for the Hoyas with a time of 20:42. Second was junior Melissa Grelli, finishing eighth in 21:10. Junior Jenny Funk and senior Hillary Bontz took 16th and 17th place with times of 21:34 and 21:36, respectively. The last scorer for the Hoyas was 23rd place sophomore Natasha LaBeaud, crossing the line in 21:24.
On Nov. 11, the teams will travel to Lock Haven, PA for the Mid-Atlantic regional meet. Both teams are ranked first in the region, and Head Coach Ron Helmer expects the teams to compete very well at the meet. The top two teams of each race will automatically advance to the national level, and the Georgetown men and women certainly have a shot.
“We have very competitive teams, and we have a history of success at the national level,” Helmer said. “We have good depth, and I am proud of the teams’ results.”
“The Georgetown program had a long line of top-10 performances and I know we can be the team to bring that tradition back to the hilltop,” Maloy added. “I am really looking forward to another shot at racing the best in the country to see exactly how good we can be.”
