(photo by Tim O'Dowd)
Competing at their first NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships, the William and Mary women's duo of
Emily Stites (Wyoming, Ohio) and
Elaina Balouris (Allison Park, Pa.) gave a pair of gutsy efforts and finished sixth and 14th, respectively, in the national 5,000m final. Running against not only the 14 other elite runners but also the mile-high atmosphere in Albuquerque, N.M., the Tribe runners turned in very respectable showings, Stites crossing the line in 16:27.99 and Balouris in 17:05.30.
Early, it looked like the race was mirroring last fall's cross country championships, with a relatively unheralded runner opening up a sizeable lead while the main pack and eventual winners patiently reeled her back in over the course of the race. While that drama was happening up front, Stites and Balouris ran a smart race working together in the secondary pack, around 10th place, and calmly worked their way back into contact with about 800m to go. From there, Stites continued to pick off stragglers, moving up and eclipsing four more runners over the final half-mile to earn her sixth-place finish.
Both women earned All-American honors again, the third time for Stites who will be named First-Team All-America by the USTFCCCA by virtue of her top-eight finish when the final list is published early next week. For Balouris, her Second-Team All-America certificate is the fifth of her outstanding career, tying the W&M program record alongside Janice Brown '93 and Marcie Homan '95. Going into the spring season, the senior will have the chance to become the all-time most honored athlete in school history if she can qualify for the NCAA outdoor championships for the third year in a row.
With the sixth-place showing, Stites scored three team points for W&M, which is the most-ever at an indoor national championship. At the conclusion of the night's events, that ranked the Tribe in a tie for 25th overall out of 34 scoring teams. Stites' time is also notable in a number of other dimensions. Her finishing time of 16:27.99 is the 15th-fastest ever run indoors for the Green and Gold, and was equivalent to a sea-level 16:01. Her sixth-place finish is the second-highest ever indoors for W&M, behind only Janice Brown's 5th-place showing at the 1992 NCAA Championships. Friday night also marked the first time ever that W&M had sent more than one athlete to the national indoor championships in the same year, much less the same event.
With the indoor season now complete, the team's attention turns to outdoors. William and Mary will open the spring schedule in two weeks, March 21-22, hosting the Tribe Invitational at Zable Stadium and the Stimson Throwing Events Area.
2014 NCAA Indoor Championships
Women's 5,000m Finals1. Abbey D'Agostino (Dartmouth) 16:20.39
2. Aisling Cuffe (Stanford) 16:22.48
3. Kathy Kroeger (Stanford) 16:23.34
4. Emma Bates (Boise St.) 16:25.66
5. Juliet Bottorff (Duke) 16:26.53
6. Emily Stites (W&M) 16:27.997. Shalaya Kipp (Colorado) 16:32.03
8. Emily Sisson (Providence) 16:34.18
9. Hannah Walker (Florida St.) 16:35.01
10. Elinor Kirk (UAB) 16:36.12
11. Chelsea Blaase (Tennessee) 16:38.34
12. Erin Finn (Michigan) 16:51.10
13. Pippa Woolven (Florida St.) 17:04.09
14. Elaina Balouris (W&M) 17:05.3015. Meghan McGlinchey (La Salle) 17:07.87
16. Molly Grabill (Oregon) 17:27.51
Team Standings (6 of 17 events scored, 34 teams scoring)1. Stanford 22
2. Florida 19
3. Texas A&M 16
4. South Dakota 13
5. Georgia 11.5
...
T25. William and Mary 3
