CCAA Preview (Women)
The women of Chico State are looking to extend their conference reign another year. Just like the men, they have been completely dominant of the CCAA and it doesn’t appear a changing of the guard will be happening this year.
Ranked 1st in the West region, another CCAA team doesn’t show up until 7th on that list. Stanislaus State sits at #7 with Cal State San Marcos at #9.
If we look at the first meet of the year for the Wildcats, it looked like they could be in for some trouble after losing to Stanislaus State, but it was made apparent that a top scorer didn’t run for them at the time. Even if that were the case, they finished only four points behind.
We saw Karlie Garcia finish 4th overall at the Santa Clara Invite wiched helped get Chico to a 5th place finish within the D1 race. Alexandria Tucker was 24th and Kayden Carpenter was 38th for a solid top three scorers. Their fourth and fifth finished together in 68th and 69th place. With that finish, they bested Stanislaus State by seven team spots and over 100 points.
There were some different names for the Wildcats in their most recent race that saw Tucker and Carpenter serve as the 1-2 runners. Nora Pizzella, Desirae Jones, and Nadine Dubon all finished inside the top 20 to help clinch the team title.
Chico continues to show us that they have depth and that it could be anyone’s day to lead the team. They’ll continue their dominance this weekend and take home their 13th straight conference title.
Stanislaus State had us all excited at the beginning of the year when they defeated Chico State. Unfortunately, that excitement may have worn off after the Santa Clara race.
The Warriors are led by Kayla Jacklich who had continued to improve throughout the season and saw her best performance at Santa Clara. Yajaira Salinas was the next scorer for them in 60th place. Isabel Mendoza, Kylie Cleveland, and Emily Delgado helped the Warriors finish 12th as a team. The biggest takeaway here is that their pack time is only a minute. Being able to group together like this should help them edge the other teams in the conference.
If they want even a small shot at taking down Chico, they’ll need to see some big performance and enter single-digit scoring this weekend. Without anyone inside the top 10, their chances decrease significantly.
Predictions
Team
1. Chico State Wildcats
2. Stanislaus State Warriors
3. Cal State San Marcos Cougars
Individual
1. Alexandria Tucker (Chico State)
2. Lisa Flora (Cal St. San Marcos)
3. Karlie Garcia (Chico State)
4. Kayden Carpenter (Chico State)
5. Cessair McKinney (Humboldt State)