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TSR's 2024 Preseason D2 XC Top 25 Rankings: Just Missed & Honorable Mentions (Women)
- Gavin Struve
- Jul 31, 2024
- 6 min read
Over the next handful of days, we will be releasing our preseason rankings for Division Two and Division Three athletes.
Ranking a smaller amount of athletes (25 athletes for D2 and 20 athletes for D3 compared to 50 athletes for D1) arguably makes it even more difficult to decide which names should earn the final few spots in our rankings and what dreaded cuts we need to make.
Detailed in this article are our "Just Missed" and "Honorable Mention" names who merited mention and discussion when crafting our D2 top-25 lists.
Tomorrow, you can find our "Just Missed" and "Honorable Mention" names on the Division Three side and the first batch of rankings for D2 (athletes ranked 25-21). As a reminder, you can find our rankings rubric here.
JUST MISSED (in no particular order)
Elise Leveel, Senior, West Texas A&M
Elise Leveel's first season at West Texas A&M, at least on the grass, may not have unfolded the way either party had hoped for. Even so, there's ample reason to believe that she can return to the All-American form that she displayed in the previous season while running for Charleston (WV).
After finishing the fall of 2022 as a top-half All-American, Leveel went west and saw mixed results last year. While it was tough to contextualize results at the Big Country Festival and the Texas Tech Open, Leveel likely wanted to place higher than 46th at the Live in Lou XC Classic or 20th at the South Central Regional XC Championships.
A 47th-place effort at the 2023 cross country national meet was probably one of her better efforts of the season, but we were holding out hope that Leveel may have something bigger in store for her season finale.
Another year training under Coach Zach Daniel and practicing alongside national title contender Sarah Koomson should only help Leveel rediscover her top form. She already hinted that she may be returning to that level by running a 5000-meter PR of 16:45 at the 2024 indoor national meet.
Leveel's 2024 landing spot is probably somewhere in between her 18th-place national meet finish in the fall of 2022 and her 47th-place result in 2023. A spot in our "Just Missed" section reflects that.
Hannah Hartwell, Junior, Fort Lewis
Following her breakout track season that culminated in a 5th-place effort over 10,000 meters at the 2024 outdoor national meet, Hannah Hartwell's debut cross country season figures to be one of the most interesting RMAC storylines to monitor.
After transferring from the junior college level, Hartwell made a fast assimilation back to the NCAA (she ran one season for Cal Poly Humboldt in 2019) and seemingly acclimated to altitude quickly.
A transitional season off last fall may have helped Hartwell hit the ground running as she produced a 34:51 (10k) PR in a win (open section) at the Bryan Clay Invitational, earned bronze over that distance at the RMAC Outdoor Championships and then had the race of her life on the national stage.
One could argue that 5k track success is more valuable than 10k track success for women's cross country runners. Still, the outstanding aerobic strength that Hartwell displayed earlier this year is undeniable. While her spring success doesn't guarantee Hartwell is a top-25 or even a top-50 cross country name, her upside is arguably higher than that of all of her "Just Missed" peers entering this fall, in part because she's an unknown quantity on the grass.
Cassidy Walchak-Sloan, Senior, Saint Martin’s
Few women peaked for the postseason quite as well as Cassidy Walchak-Sloan did in the fall of 2023 and in her first NCAA Championship appearance no less.
This Saint Martin's Saints senior was solid in the month of October, placing 17th at the Lewis XC Crossover and 6th at the GNAC XC Championships, hinting at All-American potential if everything went her way on November 18th. All that happened and more as Walchak-Sloan finished in 27th place at the 2023 NCAA XC Championships.
While new PRs of 4:50 (mile) and 16:40 (5k) are solid, we didn't necessarily learn anything about Walchak-Sloan over the first half of 2024.
That makes it quite difficult to place her in our top-25 rankings. Walchak-Sloan wasn't a top-30 runner for the entirety of last fall and while her trajectory suggests that she could improve upon her 27th-place finish from last year, we just haven't seen enough from her before then, since or in other championship settings to bank on it.
Iresh Molina, Junior, Chico State
A 12th-place result over 10,000 meters at the 2024 outdoor national meet feels like it lines up almost symmetrically with the 31st-place performance that Iresh Molina posted at the 2023 NCAA XC Championships.
Not only did Iresh Molina raise her game and come through on the biggest stage in the fall, but she maintained that momentum and consistency six months later and should be in line for improvement half a year after that (and under four months from today).
She didn't just perform under pressure at various NCAA Championships but also at the APU Franson Last Chance meet with a 34:19 (10k) PR and win to qualify for the postseason.
Sure, we may have liked to see this Wildcat ace be a more constant star presence throughout each season rather than just at the end of them. Perhaps that progress will come this year. However, what we do know is that among the women who did not make our top-25 rankings, Iresh Molina feels among the closest to being an All-American lock.
Kate Hedlund, Rs. Senior, UC-Colorado Springs
The biggest name in our "Just Missed" section, Kate Hedlund has produced a wide range of outcomes over her collegiate career. She placed 77th in her 2023 fall capper after snagging the final back-half All-American spot (20th place) at the 2022 NCAA XC Championships.
Look closer, however, and you'll see that the gulf between her 2022 and 2023 form was far more narrow than it would seem just by comparing postseason performances. After all, Hedlund placed 13th at the 2023 Live in Lou XC Classic to beat a horde of All-Americans.
She looked far more like herself at the 2024 NCAA Championships of the spring and fall, finishing 8th place in the mile and 9th place over 1500 meters. Hedlund is a versatile four-time All-American and fifth-year senior. She's also someone who has never finished higher than 33rd at the RMAC XC Championships in four tries.
It would hardly shock us if Hedlund returned to top-20 status, but she's not a guaranteed All-American even for all of her talent.
Lesli Salas, Sophomore, Dallas Baptist
I'm a big believer in the freshman-to-sophomore leap and Lesli Salas appears to be in store for a considerable one.
The DBU talent was among the best rookies in Division Two last year and you need to look no further than our "End of Season Awards" for testament. Salas earned a win in just her third race of the fall months and beat an All-American (Sophia Strange) who is also featured on this "Just Missed" list in the process. Then, after some take-it-or-leave-it efforts on the conference and regional stages, Salas put together a very solid 52nd-place effort at the NCAA XC Championships.
Salas' momentum and status as a nationally competitive name continued into her debut indoor and outdoor track seasons as she ran as fast as 16:34 (5k). An All-American encore seems more likely than not for one of the nation's top underclassmen.
Della Molina, Junior, Chico State
While her sister, Iresh Molina, placed 12th in the 10k at the 2024 NCAA Outdoor Championships, Della Molina finished 11th over 5000 meters at the same meet. That came after she finished just six spots (37th) behind her twin at the NCAA XC Championships to emerge as an underclassman All-American.
Considering that she placed a respectable 92nd at the cross country national meet the year before, Della Molina appears to be following an enviable linear line of development.
It's not as if Chico State competed in a murderer's row of meets last fall, but the fact that Della Molina never placed lower than 5th (or higher than 3rd) heading into the national meet speaks to a level of consistency that's difficult to find outside of our top-25 rankings.
Maybe that's just an indication that this Wildcat wonder will have made our estimation of her look conservative by this season's end.
Sophia Strange, Senior, Oklahoma Baptist
After dominating the Great American Conference in the fall of 2022, Sophia Strange did the same in 2023 (much like the East Central men).
The difference from one year to the next was that Strange qualified for her first NCAA XC Championships last year. Not only that, but she surprised almost everyone by earning All-American billing somewhat comfortably as she placed 32nd.
We haven't seen this Oklahoma Baptist veteran race national-caliber competition often since then and we didn't learn much from Strange defending her 5k and 10k conference titles. Naturally, how she fares in her second NCAA Championship appearance (assuming she gets there) is difficult to project. That will likely remain the case entering November considering the relatively modest schedule that the Bison face.
Regardless, it's become apparent that Strange is a singular talent after seeing her nab All-American honors in her first crack at it.
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in no particular order)
Madison Clay (Catawba)
Lara Murdock (UC-Colorado Springs)
Bethany Mapes (Biola)
Hannah Smrcka (Lewis)
Grace Strongman (Colorado Mines)
Alyssa Becker (U-Mary)
Fiona Hawkins (Adams State)
Margot Thomas-Gatel (CSU-Pueblo)
Ila Davis (Western Washington)
Mollie Scott (Wingate)
