No. 22 Women's Cross Country to Race at Penn State, Host Tribe Open This Saturday

10/14/04 2:09PM

WILLIAMSBURG, VA - Defending CAA Champion William and Mary women’s cross country, ranked 22nd in this week's FinishLynx/NCAA Division I Women’s Cross Country National Poll, has a busy Saturday ahead of it as it contests the competitive Penn State National Invitational in State College, PA and hosts its own Tribe Open in Williamsburg. The Tribe Open, the squad's second home event of the season, will start at 11:00 a.m. Saturday, October 16, and be held on a revised 3.03 mile course at Eastern State Hospital. Directions to the meet can be found at the end of this release. Scheduled to compete at the Tribe Open are Hampton, Norfolk State, Longwood, Charleston, Elon and Penn State-Altoona. At the College's first home meet of the year, the season-opening Colonial Invitational, W&M claimed first and second in team standings with evenly split squads while Tribe runners swept the top four in individual standings with sophomore Julia Cathcart (Satrkville, MS) taking the win on the 2.89 mile layout.

At Penn State's National Invitational the Tribe will aim to continue its impressive run against nationally-ranked opposition. Contesting the 6,000m race along with the Tribe are No. 2 Providence, No. 5 Duke, No. 24 West Virginia and No. 29 Boston College, and the field presents the Green and Gold another opportunity to solidify its strength of schedule and gain national recognition. After starting the year unranked, the Tribe has made a convincing case for its No. 22 ranking, thanks to outracing higher-ranked teams head-to-head on a consistent basis. At the Paul Short Invitational, the College parlayed three runners in the top-25 of the national-caliber field into a strong fourth place, outpacing then- No. 15 Georgetown and No. 27 Yale. The Tribe continued to impress at the Notre Dame Invitational, beating out then- No. 12 UCLA and No. 20 Butler to take sixth in the 5,000m Blue Race.

Individual performances have also highlighted the team's effort to date. Cathcart has been named CAA Runner of the Week twice, and in addition to her Colonial Invitational victory the 2003 CAA Co-Rookie of the Year truly impressed with her sterling fifth-place performance at the Paul Short Invitational as she finished among the top runners in the nation. Fellow 2003 CAA Co-Rookie of the Year Meghan Bishop (Blue Bell, PA) has also been named CAA Co-Runner of the Week on one occasion and shares team's the best 5,000m time on the season with Cathcart (17:30).