TSR's 2022 Preseason D1 XC Top 25 Rankings (Women): #2 New Mexico Lobos

When a women's cross country team is preparing themselves for a podium campaign, they likely have to accept the fact that the New Mexico women are going to be one of the top-four teams at the national meet.

And no matter how good we think the Lobos are, they almost always deliver.

Coach Joe Franklin's program has been a podium team in four out of the last five cross country national meets. And in 2022, that number will likely become five out of the last six. While key veterans from last year do leave the program, a wave of rising stars and overwhelming depth should put New Mexico in the "title contender" category.

While winning NCAA gold has never been more challenging than it is now, this team, on the right day, is capable of standing atop of the podium.

* * *

The Lobos' 2021 fall cross country season truly began at the Joe Piane Invitational, a loaded meet which featured some of the absolute best distance programs in the country.

Facing the likes of NC State, Alabama, Washington and more, the New Mexico women needed to exhibit a combination of elite firepower and extensive depth in order to take down their national-caliber opponents.

And for the most part, they accomplished that.

Former D2 star Stefanie Parsons had joined the Lobos as a graduate transfer during the offseason. However, no one could have expected her to have such a monumental impact as quickly as she did. Parsons threw down a huge 4th place finish to give her team a pleasantly surprising low-stick scoring boost.

With teammate Emma Heckel having one of the best races of her career by finishing 16th overall, and veteran Adva Cohen holding her own with a 23rd place finish, the Lobos were in a very solid position through three runners.

With Amelia Mazza-Downie, Gracelyn Larkin and Andrea Modin Engesæth stringing together finishes of 25-26-29, the New Mexico women were able to close out their scoring with a total of six women who could be true front-runners for even a few other top-ranked teams.

Admittedly, the NC State women simply had way too much firepower for New Mexico to overcome with all five of their scorers crossing the line before Heckel did. Still, the Lobos were able to score 94 points, defeating an extremely talented Alabama squad by over 50 points.

Once again, the Lobos looked like early-season locks for the podium.

However, New Mexico's next race would feature an even larger and more challenging field, one that would force the Albuquerque-based program to face the NC State women yet again and another podium contender: the BYU Cougars.

And yet, despite the talent-laden lineups in this race, New Mexico thrived beyond expectations. The combination of Parsons, Larkin and Heckel finished 12-15-16 in what was one of the most impressive displays of compact firepower from the entire meet.

That scoring trio, however, may not have been the best part of the meet for the Lobos. Harvard graduate transfer Abbe Goldstein flexed very encouraging endurance-centric fitness with a 24th place finish while then-youngster Samree Dishon held her own for an excellent 26th place result.

With Adva Cohen finishing 34th and Modin Engesæth placing 47th to round their top-seven, the New Mexico women may have had the most complete lineup in the field. As a result, the Lobos were rewarded with an upset victory over a Hannah Steelman-less NC State squad.

New Mexico notched 92 points to get a 10-point edge over the Wolfpack, giving them a marquee win which suggested that they could contend for the national title.

But Steelman was not racing for the Raleigh-based women and the scoring gap wasn't so large that New Mexico was now the overwhelming national title favorite.

They still had some work to do.

Despite the Mountain West XC Championships featuring top-ranked teams such as Utah State and Colorado State, the Lobos were simply the better group...by a lot. In one of the best non-Power Five conferences in the nation, the New Mexico women put together a perfect top-seven sweep of the field.

And after cruising through their Mountain regional race, the New Mexico women ventured to Tallahassee where they would toe the line for the national meet. In the eyes of some, the Lobos were capable of winning gold, maybe even as the favorites.

Once there, Heckel and Larkin locked-down 18th and 21st place finishes, giving the Lobos a strong, but unsurprising 1-2 All-American scoring punch. Parsons (36th) and Cohen (41st) were excellent in their own rights, giving New Mexico a lethal top-four.

However, in comparison to NC State and a few other programs, the upper-tier firepower just wasn't there. While three All-Americans and a near-fourth was extremely encouraging to see, the Wolfpack women simply had more women who finished higher.

Despite that, Goldstein (47th) and Mazza-Downie (56th) did a phenomenal job in the fifth and sixth spots of this lineup. Depth, once again, proved to be the least concerning aspect of New Mexico's top-seven from last fall.

In the end, the Lobos would settle for a 3rd place team finish, eight points behind a BYU squad that was a bit better in their first two scoring spots. And while New Mexico didn't win the national title, they still left behind a season that they could be happy about.

* * *

This is the part of the article where we usually talk about who this team is losing from their 2021 varsity lineup. Based on New Mexico's roster, that would be Parsons, Cohen and Modin Engesæth -- the former being an All-American and the latter two women emerging as scorers throughout last fall.

For almost any other team in the nation, those are departures that would cripple the scoring integrity of a varsity lineup for the following year.

But for as important as those three women were in 2021, New Mexico is simply too deep and too accomplished to be significantly impacted by those scoring losses in 2022. There is too much experience, too much upside, too much depth, too much All-American firepower and too many scoring options for this team to be any worse than they were last year.

Let's start with Emma Heckel and Gracelyn Larkin, the dynamic scoring duo who are listed at TSR #8 and TSR #10 in our preseason individual rankings. Together, these two women make up one of the best 1-2 scoring punches in the NCAA.

And frankly, that's all of the analysis that we really have to offer on these two. They were both super reliable throughout last fall and got even better on the track. Heckel and Larkin went on to run 15:41 and 15:29, respectively, for 5000 meters. Larkin would emerge as a backend All-American at both the indoor and outdoor national meets.

As long as these two women replicate last year's performances and move up in the results simply by virtue of now-graduated veterans, then that will be more than enough for New Mexico to be a podium team once again.

Of course, how the rest of this lineup evolves is going to be the real determinant of the Lobos' season-long success in 2022.

It feels like there are five women who could realistically slide into the third scoring spot on this lineup. A few of those candidates are top returners from the grass, but the other portion of those lineup contenders are women who were beyond outstanding on the track.

Amelia Mazza-Downie, for instance, showed promise as an occasional top-five scorer for New Mexico last fall. However, her 56th place finish at the national meet would be far from her best result during the 2021-22 academic calendar.

On the track, this Aussie superstar posted fantastic times of 15:37 (5k) and 32:55 (10k). That 5k personal best came at the indoor national meet where she earned 7th place All-American honors.

It's abundantly clear that Mazza-Downie is better now than she was at this time last year...but how much better does that mean that she'll be on the grass? We have the New Mexico ace listed at TSR #27 in our preseason individual rankings and that seems like a fair spot for her.

But trying to figure out whether or not the 2021 Mountain West cross country champion will be an elite low-stick scorer throughout the entirety of this fall, instead of just once, is hard to know. We certainly think she'll reach that status more consistently, but translating track performances to the grass is never perfect.

It's a similar story for Elise Thorner, one of the biggest breakout stars of the past year.

Last fall, Thorner showed tons of varsity potential on the grass. She finished 6th in the "Open" race at Joe Piane and then won the "B" race at the Nuttycombe Invite. However, after a 26th place finish at the Mountain West XC Championships, she would not compete for the rest of the postseason.

Of course, the version of Thorner that we saw on the grass last fall is dramatically different compared to the version of Thorner that we saw on the track this past spring,

On the outdoor oval, the New Mexico superstar dropped outstanding times in the 1500 meters and the 3000 meter steeplechase, running 4:15 (1500) and 9:32 (steeple). Thorner would go on to earn a huge 5th place All-American finish in what may have been the fastest overall steeplechase final in NCAA history.

It would be a complete shock if Thorner wasn't a top-five scorer for New Mexico this fall. In fact, we have her ranked at TSR #44 in our preseason individual rankings. But much like Mazza-Downie, we have no definitive way of knowing just how good Thorner will be this fall.

Everything we've seen from her suggests that she should be a top-ranked name and a potential All-American, but like we mentioned before, there's no guarantee that happens.

One name who is ranked between Mazza-Downie and Thorner in our preseason individual rankings is NCAA veteran Abbe Goldstein.

Sitting at TSR #39, Goldstein is primarily a miler who turned out to be far better on the grass last fall than we were expecting her to be. While her 4:35 mile PR does catch your attention, so should her 47th place finish at last year's national meet.

For the most part, Goldstein was reliable last fall and we probably feel the safest about her being a top-five scorer for the New Mexico women this fall. However, if the Lobos truly want to contend for the national title, then at a bare minimum, they need her to be an All-American.

That seems like a very realistic ask, especially after holding her own in major invitationals throughout last fall.

We just listed five New Mexico women who could a) be All-Americans later this fall and b) find themselves in the Lobos' top-five over the next three months. However, those are not the only women who could crack this team's scoring roster.

* * *

Samree Dishon and Aliandra Upshaw had a varied amount of scoring impact on the grass last fall. However, their recent progress on the track is too good to ignore. The former was a "Just Missed" name in our preseason individual rankings while the latter can be found in our "Honorable Mentions" section.

Dishon turned out to be a 10k specialist this past spring, running a huge PR of 33:09. That time, paired with a VERY underrated 26th place finish at Nuttycombe, is extremely encouraging to see.

However, a tough outing at the Mountain regional meet ultimately kept Dishon out of the Lobos' national meet lineup last fall.

At her best, Dishon is almost certainly a top-five scorer for New Mexico in 2022. She was a bit inconsistent last fall, but it's almost unheard of for someone to be a top-30 finisher at Nuttycombe and not make the national meet unless there is an injury or illness involved.

But now that she's another year older, we believe in her abilities.

Then there is Upshaw, another promising 10k talent who ran 33:18 this past spring. She was also the 3rd place finisher in the "B" race at Nuttycombe last fall and went on to finish 140th at the national meet.

Much like Dishon and nearly everyone else on this roster, Upshaw is undeniably better now than she was a year ago. On paper, she should be able to crack this team's top-seven, or even their top-five. But at this point in the article, you can probably guess what I'm going to say next -- we just don't know for sure.

A few other women such as Sarah Eckel, Camille Jackson and Samantha Valentine should also be on your radar. Although honestly, Coach Joe Franklin always produces a new surprise star every single year. There is almost certainly going to be a lesser-known runner whose name we've never heard of before become a top-seven contributor this fall.

* * *

In theory, New Mexico at least has a chance of taking home the national title this fall. They are absolutely deep enough to pull it off and they have a good number of elite scorers who they can rally around.

However, the biggest (and maybe only) flaw that I can find with this team is that most of the women in the Lobos' projected varsity lineup aren't proven. Heckel, Larkin and Goldstein are the only women who we feel are going to be truly reliable.

Women like Mazza-Downie, Thorner, Dishon and Upshaw should be really good, but we haven't seen them be actual top-tier All-American candidates on the grass...at least not yet. Simply put, we are heavily banking on over half of New Mexico's projected lineup to deliver on their full potential -- and that's a huge ask.

But this is the Lobos we're talking about. When have they ever disappointed?

Our TSR #1 team will be extremely difficult to take down, but if any other distance program in the NCAA is capable of doing so, then it's the New Mexico women.