TSR's 2022 Preseason D1 XC Top 25 Rankings (Women): #19 Providence Friars

Every year, there are always one or two teams who get caught in our internal TSR hype train where we convince ourselves that a certain squad could be due for a breakout year.

And in 2022, on the women's side, that team is Providence.

The Friars are set to have a strong team this year. They return nearly everyone from last fall and are likely riding the high of numerous breakout track seasons that they saw this past winter and spring.

With a season of valuable experience now under their belts, this team could be a real problem for their BIG East competitors over the next few months.

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The Providence women began their 2021 cross country season at the Battle in Beantown where they would face a sneaky-good field which included teams like North Carolina, Duke, Connecticut and Harvard.

While the Friars didn't exactly wow us, they still put together a very solid group of four scorers. The combination of Laura Mooney, Lilly Tuck, Maria Coffin and Shannon Flockhart secured placements of 8-14-15-18 while Orla O'Connor placed 27th to close out the team scoring.

In the end, the North Carolina Tar Heels took home the win with 64 points, 18 points ahead of Providence. Still, the Friars had to be pleased with their early-season effort. They only had one true gap in their lineup and the team as a whole seemed to run fairly well together.

And three weeks later, things only got better.

At Nuttycombe, the Friars were excellent. Coffin, Mooney and Tuck put together a potent top-three, earning overall finishes of 22nd place, 25th place and 27th place. Shannon Flockhart would eventually earn a 79th place finish while Kimberly May finished 118th place to close out the scoring.

While the backend of this lineup could have been better, it was hard to be upset with anyone's performance. Coffin, Mooney and Tuck put together a lethal scoring trio and the supporting cast proved to be good enough.

In the end, Providence landed an outstanding 8th place team finish in the largest and most competitive regular season meet of the year.

But just when we thought that the Friars could do no wrong, the Providence women toed the line for the BIG East XC Championships. Despite facing Georgetown, Connecticut, Butler and Villanova, the Providence was the favorite to take home the conference crown.

That, however, didn't happen.

Instead, the Friars faltered -- a lot. They finished 5th place overall, losing to all of the programs mentioned above. And although some of the team scores were somewhat close, Providence simply couldn't find an edge at any point in their lineup.

Coffin (8th) and Mooney (9th) held their own, but in comparison to other scoring duos, there was room for improvement. Tuck (16th) and Flockhart (17th) were far from bad, but Tuck had proven that she was a top-10 BIG East talent earlier in the season. Orla O'Connor's 32nd place finish wasn't that much worse in comparison to the fifth scorer from other teams, but it didn't add much to Providence's scoring value, either.

From an analysts' perspective, Providence's 5th place finish was a little frustrating. Not because they fell back so far in the results, but because it was hard to pinpoint what went wrong. In comparison to the top-four teams, the Friars had a very similar lineup structure.

Fast forward to the Northeast XC Regional XC Championships and one had to think that Providence would bounce back and earn a top-two automatic qualifying result to the national meet.

But instead, Providence settled for 3rd place behind Harvard and Syracuse. Luckily, the Friars still had plenty of Kolas points and they ultimately put themselves in the national meet.

Unfortunately, the Friars regular season success had run out by the team they reached Tallahassee. Laura Mooney had a very solid 60th place effort and Maria Coffin held her own by placing 89th. However, from there, the gaps were extensive.

The final three Providence scorers placed 160th, 201st and 213th overall. And as a result, the Friars faded to 26th place in the team standings, a relatively underwhelming finish compared to what we had seen from them at Nuttycombe.

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Despite the not-so-great end to their season, the amount of optimism that we have for this Providence program is sky high. This team proved to us last season, specifically at Nuttycombe, that they could be one of the better teams in the NCAA if everyone runs well on the same day.

And while they do lose a key name in Maria Coffin, their number of returners and the overall growth that we're expecting to see from this program far outweighs her departure...we think.

Laura Mooney proved to be a key front-runner throughout last fall and a reliable one at that. However, her ongoing rise during the indoor and outdoor track seasons, where she ran 9:18 (3k), 16:09 (5k) and 33:23 (10k), leads us to believe that she can be an All-American this fall.

And depending on how high of an All-American can be, Mooney's progression this fall could end up cutting off a significant amount of points from Providence's team score -- a rarity for most true front-runners.

The other potential low-stick on this team is Lily Tuck, although her status fluctuates between "front-runner" and "middle-lineup scorer".

Seeing Tuck finish 27th at Nuttycombe was monumental. That result gave her team a ton of scoring potency and a pleasantly surprising boost.

However, from there, she finished outside of the top-15 at the BIG East XC Championships, outside of the top-35 at the Northeast Regional XC Championships and outside of the top-200 at the cross country national meet.

If Tuck can replicate her Nuttycombe performance on a far more consistent basis, then the loss of Maria Coffin will be far less damaging. Of course, that is a lot easier said than done.

From there, Shannon Flockhart is likely the next in line when it comes to constructing Providence's 2022 cross country lineup. However, despite being the third or fourth scorer for this team last fall, placing 79th at Nuttycombe and 10th at her regional meet, Flockhart's performances on the track suggest that she can be a true star over the next few months.

With times of 2:49 (1k), 4:10 (1500), 4:36 (mile) and 9:20 (3k), as well as an All-American finish in the 1500 meters back in June, it's hard to think that Flockhart won't be noticeably better this fall than she was last year.

But just how much better will she be? How many points will she cut-off from the team score?

The potential answers to those questions vary dramatically, making Flockhart the biggest x-factor on this team. In many ways, Providence will go as far as she goes this fall.

After those three, the duo of Orla O'Connor and Kimberly May will likely hold down the bottom two scoring spots in this lineup.

The good news with that duo is that both women appeared as top-five scorers at different points throughout the 2021 cross country season. May was the final scorer at Nuttycombe and the NCAA XC Championships while O'Connor was the final scorer at the Battle in Beantown and at the BIG East XC Championships.

Admittedly, both of those women will need to be significantly better in 2022. The loss of Maria Coffin theoretically opens up a fairly large scoring gap. And while the overall improvements of Mooney, Tuck and Flockhart should mitigate some of that losing scoring, O'Connor and May will need to show progress as well.

The good news is that May had a very underrated track campaign earlier this year. She ran 2:48 for 1000 meters, 4:23 for 1500 meters and 4:41 in the mile. And while none of those results blow you away, they are still fairly solid and they do suggest that May can improve upon her results later this year.

Be sure to also keep an eye on Alex O'Neill, a solid 800 meter runner, who was often part of Providence's varsity group in 2021. After a great year of middle distance performances, one has to wonder how her recent results will translate to the longer 6k distance on the grass.

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The loss of Maria Coffin is admittedly hard to overlook. Last fall, the Friars clearly had limited depth after their top-four and Coffin was more than just a middle-lineup scorer -- she was a true front-runner.

Despite the great promise that we've seen from Mooney, Tuck, Flockhart and May, there's no guarantee that those women will be better this fall. And even if they are, there's no guarantee that their collective improvements will be able to offset Coffin's absence.

Luckily, a respectable recruiting class featuring names like Niamh O'Mahony, Cara Laverty, Jane Buckley, all of whom were talented prep runners in Ireland, could absolutely step in and fill that final scoring spot.

And when you step back to evaluate this team as a whole, it's hard not to like what you see.

Is Providence a perfect team? No, maybe not. Their postseason performances from last fall left us wanting more and they lost one of their best scorers from that same team.

But let's remind ourselves that Providence has historically been one of the better teams in the NCAA. Despite a few down years as of late, Coach Ray Treacy has been able to put past Providence teams on the top of the podium multiple times.

And after showing promise over the last few seasons, the Friars' 2022 cross country season could be symbolic of an ongoing revival from this northeast distance juggernaut.