2022 Women's Way Too Early XC Preview (Part One)

The end of June is a weird time for us at The Stride Report. It's still too early in the summer to post our preseason rankings, but it's also too late in the year to simply ignore the upcoming fall season and all that comes with it.

So let's slowly dip our toes in the proverbial water of cross country analysis.

Below, I jotted down some general (and sometimes random) thoughts about the upcoming fall months and attempted to make sense of the NCAA cross country landscape as we know it.

Let's begin...

NOTE: TFRRS is used as a general guide when discussing eligibility and returners. It is possible that someone's anticipated eligibility for this upcoming cross country season isn't properly listed on TFRRS. While certain athletes and teams will be mentioned in this article, please note that any omissions should not indicate a negative view of the omitted athletes or teams in questions. There are only so many teams and athletes that we can mention.

Alright, let's just get this out of the way.

NC State is going to win another national title in cross country...right?

The Wolfpack women were incredible last year, peaking in the postseason and showing off top-end firepower that most teams struggled to match. Katelyn Tuohy reached a new level while Kelsey Chmiel continued to deliver quietly elite results.

And yes, the NC State women did lose to New Mexico at the Nuttycombe Invitational last year by nine points, but the Wolfpack didn't have Steelman or Clairmonte in that race. In fact, if you look at the Joe Piane results, you'll see that NC State handily defeated New Mexico at that meet, 38 points to 94 points.

As we look at NC State in 2022, they'll be losing Clairmonte, Steelman and Hays from last year's varsity lineup. On paper, losing that group would open up the national title picture for New Mexico and maybe one or two other surprise teams.
 

But the Wolfpack have the potential to match last year's success, although that potential is hardly guaranteed. Instead, it's more speculative.

The introduction of graduate transfer Sydney Seymour fills an Allie Hays-sized scoring hole in this varsity lineup. The rise of promising youngsters like Marlee Starliper and Gionna Quarzo this past spring also gives NC State tons of upside...but also plenty of variability.

On paper, NC State looks like they'll be just as good as last year, maybe even better. Still, there are some legitimate questions surrounding this group and enough uncertainty to hold us back from claiming the Wolfpack as air-tight locks for the national title...for now.

Because when you look at New Mexico, a team that also loses a few key veterans, there may not be any team in the NCAA with a higher ceiling than the Lobos.

The exhausted cross country eligibility of Stefanie Parsons and Adva Cohen is a tough blow, but the Lobos are far from being out of the picture when it comes to title contention. Emma Heckel, Gracelyn Larkin, Amelia Mazza-Downie and Aliandra Upshaw each bring a tremendous amount of firepower to the table.

However, more importantly, they still have tons of room to grow as each of those four women were listed with freshman or sophomore eligibility last year.

And when you look at how much more refined these women were on the indoor and outdoor ovals earlier this year, it's hard to think that they won't build upon their already-promising fitness.

Upshaw should be better on the national stage, a veteran in Abbe Goldstein returns to this lineup with extra eligibility and both Elise Thorner and Samree Dishon had huge breakout years on the track.

New Mexico isn't quite at the same level as NC State yet, but their room for improvement is arguably greater than any other team in the NCAA.

And when you consider how good the Lobos already were in 2022, it's hard to say that NC State is safe from losing the cross country team title this year.

After those two teams...well, I'm not going to lie, I really don't know what to think about everyone else.

Colorado loses Rachel McArthur, Abby Nichols, India Johnson, Micaela DeGenero and Madison Boreman.

BYU loses Whittni Orton, Anna Camp-Bennett, McKenna Lee and Sara Musselman.

Minnesota loses Bethany Hasz, Megan Hasz, Abby Kohut-Jackson and Carissa Dock.

Stanford loses Julia Heymach and Christina Aragon, Arkansas loses Krissy Gear and Logan Jolly, Iowa State loses Cailie Logue and Ashley Tutt, Oklahoma State loses Clarissa Morales, Washington loses Allie Schadler and Sophie Cantine, Ole Miss loses Anna Elkin and Clio Ozanne-Jaques and Notre Dame loses Lauren Bailey, Madeline King and Jocelyn Long.

All of that is based on eligibility from TFRRS, so do with that what you will. I should also note that when I say that a team is "losing" a certain runner, I am only talking about cross country. They may have eligibility in other seasons or may be transferring.

When you look at that entire group that I just listed, it feels almost impossible to find any disparity amongst those squads. Sure, some departures were more impactful than others, but trying to rank those teams in a definitive order is going to be wildly challenging.

A few of the top-tier titans of collegiate distance running last year (i.e. Colorado, BYU and Minnesota) all lost numerous All-American stars. In fact, their loss of top scorers was greater than anything that Stanford, Arkansas, Notre Dame, etc. went through.

But am I really going to write off Colorado? Am I really going to doubt BYU? Am I really ready to put those two teams in the same conversation as Ole Miss or Iowa State this year?

That's not a knock on the Rebels or the Cyclones, but those two Mountain region teams are historic powerhouses and both programs have made us look incredibly dumb before after we undervalued them in the past.

After all, the Buffaloes recently added Bailey Hertenstein to their roster as a graduate transfer and BYU is (likely) going to introduce high school megastar Jenna Hutchins to the NCAA this fall.

But what about Notre Dame and Stanford? Those two teams finished in the top-six of last year's national meet, but their seasons as a whole didn't at all reflect the idea of them being one of the six best teams in the country.

The Irish, for example, didn't even finish in the top-10 of the Joe Piane Invitational or the Nuttycombe Invite...that's not great. But then again, their offseason departures are probably amongst the least worrisome of the teams that I listed above.

The Cardinal, meanwhile, entered last year as one of the nation's preseason favorites. However, after a rough 5th place showing at the PAC-12 XC Championships, it's hard to gauge how we should think of a team that loses two highly potent scorers while returning a slew of high-upside youngsters.

So how do we rank those teams? What's fair? What performances deserve more weight?

I honestly don't have a good answer for you, but that's why we have TSR veteran Maura Beattie and a really strong group of writers analyzing those results and lineup structures right now.

Alright, allow me to seamlessly shift our conversation to a team that we have not yet mentioned: the Alabama Crimson Tide.

The Alabama women broke onto the cross country scene at the 2021 NCAA Winter XC Championships when they placed 8th as a team. During that year, Mercy Chelangat won the individual national title while Amaris Tyynismaa had the race of her life to place 3rd overall. Esther Gitahi placed 36th in that race, giving the Crimson Tide three All-Americans.

Admittedly, Alabama didn't deliver on expectations last fall, placing 15th at the NCAA XC Championships. However, they did that without Esther Gitahi and Amaris Tyynismaa

Gitahi is now gone, but Tyynismaa is returning alongside Chelangat as well as 2021 cross country All-American Flomena Asekol. On paper, that gives the Crimson Tide a top-three scoring group similar to the scoring trio that they had in the winter of 2021.

The difference in 2022, however, is that Alabama returns everyone except for Gitahi. This means that rising veterans like Jami Reed, Megan Patton, Leahrose Mami and Riley Schelp have a chance to close the fairly significant scoring gap between them and Alabama's top three.

If that happens, then the Crimson Tide could be on the podium come November. That, however, is also a lot to ask and far from a guarantee to happen.

But ultimately, Alabama will go as far as the backend of their lineup allows them to...and I think that's a pretty fair statement to make.