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Freshmen Lead Engineers to NEICAAA Podium
October 6, 2018
The NEICAAA Championship is a stand alone championship where the Division I, II and III teams get a chance to compete against one another at historic Franklin Park in Boston, Massachusetts. While many teams prefer out of region meets the week before, bypassing this meet, many more take part to make it a very competitive competition.
MIT's women, ranked fourth nationally in Division III, were racing without All Americans Marissa McPhillips '20 and Katie Bacher '20, but showed a very talented squad that took second place with 78 points, losing only to Division I Boston College.
The men's race showcased 26 teams, including Division II nationally ranked #18 American International and #24 Stonehill College. MIT claimed third with 125 points, losing to UMass Amherst and Northeastern University, both Division I teams.
This was a nice cross country day in that the temperatures, while humid, were in the mid-60's. The course was soft and muddy in spots, but in pretty good condition overall.
The first race of the day was the women's sub-varsity 5K. Lindsey McAllister '21, still coming back from injury, led the way for MIT, placing 22nd in 19:30. Gabby Enns '21 had a breakout race, placing 32nd in 19:39 and running a very smart, well-paced 5K. Tessa Weiss '20, also returning from injury and running her first race this year, finished 45th in 19:56. Dhaman Kaur '21 place 67th and Megan McCandless '20, racing her first race of the year, placed 74th.
The women's varsity 5K was next. With McPhillips out for personal reasons and Bacher still coming back from injury, the engineers needed their runners to step up. At the mile mark, Jenna Melanson '20 led Leandra Zimmermann '19, Izzi Gengaro '22 and Katie Collins '21 at 5:39 in around 25th-30th place. Einat Gavish '22 and Emily Niu '21 were back in 60th-65th position in 5:49. By the second mile, Gengaro had moved up to 10th with Melanson 11th and Zimmermann in 13th. Collins was in 20th and Gavish 26th. All looked pretty strong at this point and appeared to still be moving up in the field. While Gengaro was able to move up to 6th in 18:07, and Collins to 17th in 18:35, Zimmermann and Melanson fell back to 14th and 15th respectively in 18:24 and 18:26. Gavish held onto 26th in 18:54 to round out the scoring. The 47 second gap was as impressive as the individual performances, particular the efforts by freshmen Gengaro and Gavish.
In the men's varsity 8K, all MIT runners were present, but Josh Rosenkranz '19 and Josh Derrick '20 were getting over illnesses and a number of freshmen were being counted on in only their second 8K. At the mile mark, Aidan Gilson '19, Andrew Mah '22, Billy Woltz '20 and Rosenkranz led the Engineers in 4:51 at around 50th place. Derrick led Zach Johnson '22 and Nicky Medearis '22 as MIT's second group and were between 70th-80th place in 4:55. By mile two Tech runners had moved up significantly with Woltz in 28th with Mah, Rosenkranz and Gilson right with him. Johnson had moved up to 43rd and Derrick was up to 50th. Mah took over in the third mile, moving up to 17th. Woltz and Rosenkranz were in 19th and 21st, but Gilson was falling back quickly. Fortunately Johnson had moved up to 27th and Derrick 40th. In the final two miles Mah was able to move up to eighth, but then lost one place right at the finish in 25:15. Woltz moved up to 18th in 25:32, but Rosenkranz, obviously not at the top of his game, faded slightly to 27th in 25:41. Johnson held up well for a freshman but lost some ground, finishing 32nd in 25:46. Derrick closed well, placing 39th in 25:52. Medearis lost some in the middle miles but finished well, placing 59th in 26:12. Three freshman in the top six was quite an impressive effort for the class of '22.
The final race of the day was the sub-varsity 8K. Ryan Wilson '22 ran a smart, conservative first half-mile, got to where he needed to be by the mile mark, around 40th place in 5:02. Kent Slaney '21 was more aggressive, particularly in the first half-mile at 2:27, but at mile two was leading the way for MIT in eighth place in 10:18. Wilson and Daniel Weiss '19 were eight seconds back in 11th and 12th. Back in 16th, having the race of his career, was Jake Jorgensen and in 18th and 20th were teammates Alex Knapp '19 and Nassim Oufattole '22. They were chasing Northeastern University who were in 1, 2, 3, 4, 7 at that point. By mile four Wilson had passed Slaney and Jorgensen had passed Weiss. Most surprising of all, Finn Jacobson-Schulte '21 came out of nowhere to move within four seconds of Weiss. At the finish, MIT was still second to NU 17 to 51 with only Wilson breaking up the sweep. Wilson was sixth overall in 26:13. Slaney finished 12th in 26:38, followed closely by Weiss in 14th in 26:42. Jacobson-Schulte was 17th in 26:44 for a breakthrough race and Jorgensen 18th in 26:45 to close out the scoring.
Next week MIT will take a select group of runners to the Pre-National meet hosted by the University of Wisconsin - Oshkosh at the Lake Breeze course in Winneconne, WI. |
