Blue Devils Set for Pre-National Invitational Saturday

Saturday, October 19

Terre Haute, Ind.

11 AM

Duke University

Pre-Nationals (M & W)

Blue Devils Set for Pre-National Invitational Saturday

10/17/2019 1:46:00 PM | Cross Country

DURHAM, N.C. – Both the men's and women's cross country teams will compete at Pre-Nationals Saturday morning on the LaVern Gibson Championship Course in Terre Haute, Ind.

The women's 6k race will begin at 11 a.m., while the men's 8k race will start at approximately 11:35 a.m.

Halfway through the season, both the men and women have enjoyed successful seasons. The men opened the season with a victory at the Elon Opener on Aug. 30, then took second at the Cavalier Classic two weeks later on Sept. 14. Traveling north to St. Paul, Minn., Duke placed first at the Roy Griak Invite on Sept. 28, then added its third first place finish of the season the following weekend at the Great American XC Festival in Cary, N.C. on Oct. 5.

"So far season has gone very well," said men's head coach Norm Ogilvie. "Coming off winning the Griak meet and only losing to one team so far against 28 victories and that one team was ranked 16th in the nation in Virginia. This weekend we'll face nine nationally ranked teams. Upfront has been CJ Ambrosio and Paul Dellinger. They've been a one, two punch for us pretty much all season, and then Alex Miley has also been a top-three guy all pretty much all season so those three guys are our leaders and we have a really solid fourth and fifth man with the freshman Zach Kinne and senior Tom Sullivan."

The Duke men will field seven runners Saturday, including Sullivan, Ambrosio, Dellinger, Miley and Michael Ungvarsky, along with Kinne and freshman Sam Rivera.

The women placed three runners in the top-five at the Elon Opener on Aug. 30 and earned fourth place overall. Duke then recorded three top-10 finishes at the Virginia Tech Invitational on Sept. 20, finishing second, before running two girls and earning two top-five finishes at the Great American XC Festival on Oct. 5.

"We have put in a solid four weeks of training and so this is the first time we're going to have a complete squad and to really test ourselves against some national competition and to see where this team stacks up," said head women's coach Rhonda Riley. "As this team gets older and made up of a little bit more upperclassmen, the trainings are really accumulating season after season and we're really seeing that the fitness is much improved from last year and hopefully that's going to translate into the races."

11 runners will compete for the Duke women, including redshirt senior Gabrielle Richichi, seniors Lindsay Billings, and Sarah Armstrong, juniors Leigha Torino, Michaela Reinhart, Helen Williams, and Amanda Beach, sophomore Elizabeth Reneau and freshmen Samantha Schadler, Emily Cole and Caroline Howley.

57 men's teams and 64 women's teams will compete Saturday morning in Terre Haute. Of the men's teams, 11 are nationally ranked, including top-10 teams BYU (No. 2), Colorado (No. 3), Washington (No. 4) and Ole Miss (No. 8). On the women's side, 10 teams are nationally ranked, including a field of four top-10 universities in BYU (No. 2), Colorado (No. 3), Michigan (No. 7) and Washington (No. 8).

The women enter Saturday ranked fourth in the most recent USTFCCCA Southeast Regional Rankings, while the men are fifth.

For more information about the Pre-National meet, click here.

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