KEVIN JENISON
GoSycamores.com
TERRE HAUTE, IND. ? The Indiana State Sycamore cross country teams will race back into action this weekend as they compete in the Notre Dame Invitational Friday (Oct. 2) in South Bend, Ind. Competition begins at 2 p.m. (ET) with the Women's Gold race which will feature the Indiana State women's cross country team.
The men's' gold race will be run at 2:45 p.m. with the JV/Open Race at 3:30 p.m., the women's blue race at 4:15 p.m., and the men's blue race at 5 p.m. featuring the Indiana State men's team.
“This is probably one of the top five invitational's nationally during the cross country season,” John McNichols, Indiana State men's cross country coach, said. “There are 25 teams in the Blue Division and they are all ranked in their regions which makes this a high quality invitational.”
McNichols looks for the Sycamores to finish around 15th in the team standings.
“We are specifically looking at Dayton, who is ranked ahead of us in our region, along with MVC teams Southern Illinois and Illinois State who are in the top 15 of the Midwest Region. If we have a positive race then we could finish higher than 15.”
The race itself begins with a short straight-a-way heading into the first turn.
“It is almost a sprint from the start to that first turn,” McNichols said. “If you don't get off to a good start, you are going to get bunched up back in the pack which makes it hard, but not impossible, to move up from.”
Five of the Sycamores competing in the Blue Race have run at Notre Dame before including Michael Disher, Eric Schulz, Scott Keeney, Craig Padgett and Jeremiah Vaughn. Also competing for Indiana State will be transfers Andrew Lepkowski and Tyler Kent, along with red-shirt freshman Dustin Betz, and true freshmen Kyle Smiley and Albaro Escalera.
“That experience will help greatly,” McNichols said. “It will be exciting to find out at this point of the season just how well we stack up against some of the best teams in the nation and some of the best in our conference. It will help us prepare for the rest of the season.”
The Sycamore women will be well represented in the Gold Division race that opens the day's events. Kayla Alexander, Julia Costello, Kacie Klem, Allison Malone, Emily Pugh, Bethany Scruton, Kate tarr, Kylee Thacker and Adriane Wunderlich are all expected to compete for Indiana State.
“This meet will really test us,” John Gartland, Indiana state women's cross country coach, said. “We won the gold division of this meet as recently as three years ago (2006) and tied for ninth last year. I hope that we can work our way into the top five and be competitive but that may be a tough chore.”
Gartland said the team is also looking forward to competing against a couple of Missouri Valley teams as they begin to look ahead to the MVC Championships in October.
“I am looking forward to running against Southern Illinois and Illinois State,” Gartland said. “They both started the season very well and they were ranked higher than us in the preseason poll.”
Gartland added that how the Sycamores do against these teams in the gold race will be a good predictor of what ISU's goals for the conference championship will be.
“We will also run against Creighton in the gold division but interestingly enough, Bradley was put into the blue division,” Gartland said.
The Notre Dame Invitational will be the final tune-up for the Sycamore men before Indiana State hosts the Pre-Nationals on Saturday, Oct. 17 on the LaVern Gibson Championship Course at the Wabash Valley Family Sports Center.
The Sycamore women will follow the Notre Dame Invitational with the Bradley Classic on Friday, Oct. 16, in their final tune-up before the Missouri Valley Conference Championships which will be held in Peoria, Ill., on Oct. 31.
