CONCORD,CA - Having been a part of a Division II program (Chico State) as both an athlete and coach for the past 40ish years it makes me cringe when I read (or watch on television) of an athlete's announced college signing that usually goes something like this: "I'm extremely excited to announce that I have decided to sign with Division One, (Insert college name)...Now, I have nothing against Division I programs, or the division itself, but this verbiage has always seemed to speak down to the other divisions. If you're a fan at home and you don't know much about athletics you might just assume that all DI schools are better than the rest. Well, on Friday the Wildcats had the opportunity to show fans that division is just a number, and that running is just running, as they stepped to the line in a very DI heavy invitational hosted by St Mary's university. Thursday's pre-race talk culminated with this topic, and we entered Friday's competition looking to represent Division 2, Chico State, and hopefully Win both races.
Men's 8k:
From the top, the St Mary's 2k loop, wasn't quite 2k.. So both courses measured a bit short of their intended distances. For the men, the 8k course measured around 170m short. The women's was closer to 50m shy of the mark. (on a side-note, this didn't stop many college social media accounts from recognizing marks as "school records" . ugh). Either way, cross country is cross country, and times don't matter, but beating opponents does. Winning the race was the goal for the Chico men as they entered their season opener while lining up against NCAA West Region ranked UCLA (#9), CAL (#14), St Marys (#15) and a handful of other DI's.
The St Mary's course (hosted in Newhall Park in Concord) was a pretty standard hard packed gravel loop with only a few small rises along the way. A quick pinch-point in the first 600m created a predictable mad-dash for positioning in the early going. Thankfully the Wildcats managed the early section well, and placed themselves close enough to where they'd hoped to end up to give us a solid chance at an eventual winning outcome. In the pre-race team huddle yours truly reminded the guys that early positioning would help, but that the race wouldn't be won in the first mile or two. It'd be won in the second half when things got tough.
At the conclusion of the first lap, the pack was so thick, it was hard to know who might be winning the team battle. UCLA had quite a few in the front of the main group, as did Nevada, but Chico appeared to be positioned quite well just behind. In looking at the chip results following the race, this was confirmed, as Nevada was winning at the conclusion of lap 1, with UCLA following in second, and Chico in third. St Mary's followed in 4th, but with 4 runners operating among the lead group.
At the conclusion of lap 2 St Mary's had moved into the lead and appeared to be dominating, with 4 runners among the top 9 in the field. The problem for the Gaels was that their 5th and final scorer was 30+ positions behind their fourth. Chico on the other hand had moved into 2nd position in team scoring with it's entire top 7 now operating among the race's top 20.
The 'Cats continued to do great work throughout the field, whittling their team score with each passing revolution. Leading the way throughout, was 2 time defending CCAA champion Mario Giannini who bided his time among the shrinking lead pack until it was just he and Brittish standout Joseph O'Connell of St Mary's battling for the individual title. As the pair passed by yours truly with just over a quarter mile left of racing O'Connell had a 15-20m cushion over his Chico counterpart. As the two approached the final turn and the eventual finish straight Mario began to realize that he still had a chance at winning, and with 60m remaining he drew even, and then passed the tiring Gael. Mario would take the win, giving the 'Cats a nice 1-point start to the team scoring.
Perhaps the biggest surprise of the day for the Wildcat men was the debut of true frosh Alijah Murillo. After running a blistering 14:49 at last fall's HS state meet, Murillo was certainly on everyone's radar as a certifiable talent.. but sometimes the jump in distance, along with the increase in talent that the NCAA offers can take some time to overcome. Not for Murillo, or at least not yet, as the precocious frosh in some ways ran like a frosh, but in others, looked years ahead of his age. Ok, to explain. Every time I saw Alijah in the race he was smiling and sometimes literally pointing to friends and family to the side of the course. He was having a good time out there. His movement from outside the top-10 in the early going, to eventually finishing 5th overall was the veteran part. Either way, we have a talent on our hands here, and it's very welcomed.
Another big breakout came in the form of Alex Lamoreaux's run. Alex was a big talent coming out of HS several years ago, but it's taken some time for talent, training, and confidence to all merge together. In reality that (merge) happened last track season when Alex took his 1500 PR from 3:55 to 3:45 in the course of the season and narrowly missed punching a ticket to NCAA's while earning All CCAA honors. After a great summer of training, and feeding off the momentum built during the aforementioned track season, Alex stepped to the line in St Mary's (just a few miles from his home btw) and ran like a seasoned vet. He would climb up the lead pack throughout, eventually hitting the tape 8th overall as the 'Cats #4 just 2 seconds behind teammate Sergio Cuartas who placed 7th.
There's an argument to be made for Matthew Gordon when it comes to the 'Cats most consistent performer over the past 5 years in XC. Matt has earned All West Region each season, and looked the part on Friday, sealing the 'Cats win with his 13th place finish. Michael Torres was quite an insurance package hitting the line just 1 place behind Gordon with his best XC race to date. Sean Alliegro would finish 19th as the 'Cats 7th, and displaced every other team's #5. I have to mention that local products Charlie Brennen (Chico HS alum) and Stephan Chapdelaine (Live Oak HS/Butte College) absolutely ripped the final lap, en-route to eventual 30th and 31st place finishes.
Given the gap between the 'Cats and the rest of the assembled mostly-DI field, it was easy to forget that the 'Cats were resting the defending West Region champion Damian Garcia, who is just returning to workouts after a track season that extended well into July with his USATF 1500m champs race. As Garcia gets race-ready and is eventually injected back into the line-up, the 'Cat's should be a formidable squad on all championship stages this fall.
Women's 6k:
The Wildcat women stepped to the line with the confidence of knowing that their annual time trial produced the deepest results of any past squad, but also knowing that they were up against three top-15 ranked (regionally) DI programs in USF (#9), UCLA (#10), and CAL (#12). Add fellow DI's UCSD, SD State, St Mary's, Nevada, Seattle U, LMU, Santa Clara, San Jose, and and we had ourselves a formidable field for the season opener.
In our final pre-race chat moments before the start, I updated the women of how the men's race had transpired and that they had executed just as we'd hoped.. Not biting too hard on the initial start, but establishing position, and then running to win the race in the second half. As the women's race evolved it really did become a carbon copy of what the men's had.
As yours truly watched the field pass by twice in the first loop, it was honestly hard to say what place we were in points-wise, but we seemed to be positioned fairly well overall. In looking at the split results online this was a fair evaluation. After the first of 3 loops were covered the 'Cats sat in 2nd position overall 12 points behind UCLA. At the time only Della Molina ran among the top 10 (literally in 10th place), but Megan Malloy and Paulina Martins followed relatively closely behind. After 1 lap our 7th runner ran 35th overall.
The second lap brought progress for the 'Cats as the updated split mat showed the Chico women leading the competition, having collectively moved up quite well. Della had moved up to 4th, Malloy ran in 9th, and Martins followed in 12th. Our number 7 was now running 21st overall!
As per usual the Chico women did some really nice work in the third and final lap. Della battled for the individual title until she finally lost contact with the two leaders, eventually finishing 3rd. Malloy closed well taking 6th, with Martins following in 7th. Sienna Bianchi (11th) and Catherine McGuire (12th) sealed the Wildcat victory with their strong closes. If you're paying attention at home, Kira Forsberg and Olivia Beschorner would take 15th and 16th places, which means our #7 runner moved up from 35th to 16th from checkpoint 1 to the finish.
How dominant of a win was this for the Chico women? In looking at the results breakdown below you'll see that the 'Cats put 7 in front 7 teams' first runner, including Nevada Reno. Our 7th also beat the #2 runners from UCSD and San Diego State.
When you have a team as deep as this one, it's easy to lose track of some really impressive runs. Like that of Zoe Aitken who finished 26th today as our number 8. Zoe's best XC race to date put her in front of runner-up CAL's fourth scorer. Frosh Lucy Varela (32nd) and Maya Schiro (33rd) were also impressive in their Wildcat debuts, beating scorers from all but 2 teams in the field (not counting our own).
This was a very impressive run for the Chico women, especially given that it was our season opener, where-as most of the field opened their seasons several weeks ago.
Next up: With the championship season scheduled 2 weeks later than normal due to the NCAA Festival (in December) the 'Cats will settle back into a training cycle before resuming competitions on Friday October 9. We'll send 7 men and 7 women (most likely) up to Eugene, OR for the Dellinger Invite. The remainder of the roster will take aim at the SF Invite in Golden Gate park. Given our current depth of talent it will be fun to have four scoring teams competing on the same day! As always, thanks for your support of our sport and the Wildcat XC program.
