West Region Preview
Heading into the NCAA D3 Regional competitions, many questions pop up each year. Who looks good? Who will surprise? Which team? Which individual? This year the West Region has even more questions than usual. With an expanded region – and multiple nationally ranked teams – the West Region has more unknowns than ever, plus West Region teams look to be in the spotlight heading into the National Championships a week later.
When the NCAA established 10 Regions in Division III this past summer (instead of the eight that had been in place for years), the West Region ballooned from 21 teams to 39 teams, as the Texas schools were relocated out of the South Region.
This year’s West Region meet is hosted by Occidental College on Pomona-Pitzer’s campus course in Claremont, California. Schools from Oregon, Washington, Colorado and Texas will travel up to 1300 miles to the West Regional meet, all to pursue the chance to travel again the following week to the 2021 NCAA Division III National Cross Country Championships in Louisville, Kentucky on November 20.
Even with revised, earlier start times (8am and 9am Pacific) compared to other D3 Regions, the Claremont weather looks to be warm. Will that affect the Southern California schools? Not likely. Texas schools? Probably no. The warmth will, however, potentially impact the Pacific Northwest schools and maybe UC Santa Cruz. How about Colorado College? The Tigers will be coming down from 6000’ elevation to inhale copious amounts of sea level air and run fast – but the oxygen will be hot. There’s no sunscreen for that.
The Pomona-Pitzer course loops around an undeveloped area of Pomona College’s campus multiple times, with some visually wide-open sections on flat, well-mowed grass, and some trail sections where runners are hidden by walls of brush and trees. It’s terrific for spectators but can be humbling for runners not prepared for the toll that each loop takes.
This year’s SCIAC Championship meet was held on the course, and the Regional meet will be the third time that many SoCal teams will see it. Pomona-Pitzer gets to train on it, while rival Claremont-Mudd-Scripps runners sneak down across the street to run on it when they think no one is watching. The West Region meet has been held on this course six times before. D3 Glory Days’ Stu and Noah have questioned whether it’s true XC or not. We’ll see (and we’ll buy one of your sweatshirts at Nationals).
Both the Pomona-Pitzer and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men’s and women’s squads are all currently ranked atop the West Region polls, and all four squads are in the top-five of the National polls. In what can only be described as singularly-unique, the cross-campus rivals work out daily within shouting distance of each other. At times, they likely do shout at each other.
Pomona-Pitzer’s men, ranked #3 by D3GD , have won the last three West Region titles and are the defending NCAA Division III champs from 2019. But the Sagehens were tested by CMS, ranked #7 nationally, in the conference meet, with Pomona-Pitzer staying ahead, 34-42. Those two teams look to be in a class by themselves, with Colorado College (#26) and UC Santa Cruz hoping to capitalize on mid-October out-of-region wins and conference team victories to make it to Nationals.
Individually, Ethan Widlansky (PP) returns as defending Region Champ. Widlansky, however, took second place two weeks ago in the SCIAC Champs to CMS’ Henry Pick, who clocked a course record 24:24 on the same course that will be used Saturday. Josh Fry (Colorado College) won the SCAC Champs, while Eric Jackson (UCSC) won the C2C title, and Ryan Stracke (PLU) won the Northwest Conference title.
On the women’s side, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps has won the last three West Region titles and comes in ranked #2 in the nation behind powerhouse Johns Hopkins; Pomona-Pitzer is ranked #6 by D3GD. CMS won the Pre-National meet in early October; Pomona-Pitzer won the Augustana Interregional Invite in mid-October. CMS took an easy conference meet win over Pomona-Pitzer, 18-51, and looks to be the favorite for a fourth-straight region title. Colorado College (#29 nationally) hopes to nab a third national berth out of the region.
Individually, CMS boasts a powerful front trio of runners who have gone to the front in nearly every race this season. In fact, CMS has had a different #1 runner in all their October races: Cornell transfer Meredith Bloss led the Athenas at the SCIAC Champs, Riley Harmon led the Athenas at the Pomona-Pitzer Invite, and Natalie Bitetti led the Athenas at Pre-Nats. Who will lead at Regionals? Instead of a coin, you will need a cylinder: when flipped, it will have some non-negligible probability of landing on one of three edges. Pomona-Pitzer boasts a 1-2 punch of Genevieve DiBari and Katie Cline. Kara Putnam (Pacific) won the Northwest Conference, Iris Abegglen paced UC Santa Cruz in the C2C meet, Eliot Singer (Colorado College) won the SCAC meet just ahead of Anna Wilgenbusch of Dallas. Interestingly, Wilgenbusch was the South Regional Champion in 2019.
So many storylines coming out of the West, and the West’s teams intend to stay in the spotlight at Nationals. Watch this region!