For the first time since 1998, the Little Giant cross country team won the Great Lakes Colleges Association Men’s Cross Country Championship this weekend.
The Little Giants placed four runners in the top 15, with freshman Seth Einterz leading the pack, finishing third overall. He was the top freshman runner; the second freshman placed 25th overall. Junior Sam Compton-Craig finished 11th overall with senior Jeff Lambert right behind in 12th. Junior Hugh Jackson placed 14th overall.
Seth Einterz’s third place finish was the best finish for a freshman in a long time. “Seth had a very good performance. He’s been working hard, and he put in decent mileage over the summer,” said Head Coach Roger Busch. “What many people don’t realize on campus is that by the time the cross country runners get on campus, the season is half over. Summer is very important, and it was obvious the top runners had put in the work.”
Although the times weren’t great, it was enough to take home the championship. “In cross country you race for place, as opposed to track where you race for time,” said Coach Busch. “Since you race in different conditions and on different courses every year, time isn’t really a factor. For this race, I asked my top five guys to be in the top 15 by the three mile marker, and that is exactly what they did.”
Busch also noted that in years past, the team had a more individualistic mentality, but this year the attitude is much different.
“This year there is more of a pack mentality. If one guy starts fast, he pulls the rest of the team with him. If the guy who finishes best pull the other guys through, it is motivating,” said Busch. He called the attitude for this year a “bottom-to-top” attitude. The idea is for the fastest runner, or the top runner, to motivate the bottom runner to stay with the pack. This attitude should lead to better overall finishes for the whole team.
The only goal for the cross country team this year is constant improvement. One of the improvements that Coach Busch would like to see is a quicker pace.
“As the season progresses, we will work on speeding up the starting pace. In the next two or three races, will work on pace. This will help when we face some of the faster schools; our guys won’t be shell-shocked,” said Busch. Coach Busch projects the Little Giant cross country squad to finish no worse than third.
“Denison is a worthy opponent. They are ranked ahead of us right now, but we did beat them this weekend. Allegheny is the top team in the conference, but they are beatable. It would take the top five runners performing their best to beat them, which typically doesn’t happen, but they are beatable,” said Busch.
The cross country team will head to Purdue for the Indiana Intercollegiate Championship this weekend.