The Oregon men’s cross country team has secured the No. 1 ranking with a stranglehold this season, beginning with its unanimous selection as the nation’s best cross country team in the preseason by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association. Recent developments, however, have showcased the strength of the Ducks’ challengers close to home.
Stanford won the NCAA Pre-Nationals on Oct. 18 – appropriately, one of the more prestigious meets of the season – and was rewarded handsomely in the USTFCCCA poll, jumping from 10th to second and looking every bit the legitimate challenger to the Ducks that appeared to be missing early on. Though the crowded Pre-Nationals field was divided into two races, Stanford’s score of 77 in the second men’s heat was lower than that of No. 5 Alabama, who won the first heat with 89 points. (Oregon beat Alabama in team scoring at the Bill Dellinger Invitational on Oct. 4.
Voters in the USTFCCCA poll also gave heavy consideration to Oklahoma State’s prospects. Ranked second in the preseason, the Cowboys earned a first-place vote in the Week 3 poll to break the Ducks’ unanimous grip on the “Best Team in the Nation” moniker. Stanford supplanted the No. 3 Cowboys after the Cardinal’s strong Pre-Nationals appearance, but the Cowboys still garnered four of the 12 first-place votes in the USTFCCCA poll.
Between the fourth and fifth weeks of the season, as runners began gearing up for conference and regional meets, the polls remained unchanged.
Redshirt senior Garrett Heath and freshman Chris Derrick finished third and fourth, respectively, at the Pre-Nationals for the Cardinal, and both will be runners to watch out for at the Pacific-10 Conference championships on Friday. Fellow redshirt seniors Hakon DeVries (90th at the 2007 NCAA Championships; Stanford’s highest-finishing returner) and Hari Mix (fifth at last year’s Pac-10s, hosted by Oregon State) also return from a Cardinal cadre that finished 19th at the 2007 NCAAs.
UCLA also attended the Pre-Nationals and put together a fifth-place team finish in the second heat. The Bruins are currently ranked 13th in the nation and are considered a “much improved team” by Oregon head coach Vin Lananna, who received a first look at UCLA during the Dellinger. UCLA was fourth as a team, and redshirt senior Drew Shackleton was the highest finisher at 17th place.
The Bruins failed to make the 2007 NCAA tournament, and their highest finisher at the 2007 Pac-10s, Austin Ramos, has graduated. But UCLA has seen consistent performances out of its top five runners: Shackleton, seniors Laef Barnes and Mike Haddan, junior Marlon Patterson and sophomore Kent Morikawa.
No. 24 California had the second-best Pac-10 team time after the Ducks at the 2007 NCAAs, and two of the Bears’ top three finishers at the 2007 Pac-10s return in seniors Mark Matusak and Yosef Ghebray. The Washington Huskies, fresh off an 11th place finish in Stanford’s heat at the Pre-Nationals, share the No. 24 ranking and will look to improve upon last year’s sixth-place finish as a team in the Pac-10s.
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