Bulldog Harriers To Get Test At Sundodger Invitational
9/13/2013 12:00:00 AM | Cross Country
SPOKANE, Wash. - Gonzaga University's men's and women's cross country teams will get a little sterner test this week at 22nd annual Sundodger Invitational Saturday morning at Lincoln Park in West Seattle.
The Bulldogs opened the season Aug. 31 at the Clash of the Inland Northwest, a 4K race for the women and a 6K for the men. The distances Saturday will be 6K for the women at 11 a.m. and 8K for the men at 11:35 a.m., giving director of cross country and head men's coach Pat Tyson and head women's coach Patty Ley a better gauge on their teams.
Tyson said he learned some things about his team in the opener.
"We definitely have three really good up-front runners in freshman Troy Fraley, senior Willie Milam and junior Nick Roche. You look at their performances and Troy and Willie were just behind the winner of that race and ahead of all the (Washington State University) Cougs in a short race, but they did very, very well with Roche right in the game also," Tyson said.
But there's a gap to be closed following the top three if the Bulldogs are to be competitive.
"There is a gap of about 40 seconds to Kyle Branch and Matthew Crichlow and a minute back to Danny Lunder. We need to close the gap a little bit with Kyle, Matt, Danny, Ian Goldizen and Andy Phillips. If they can feed off each other and close the gap in an 8K somewhere in that 30-40 second range I could live with that and we'll be alright when we are holding out some of those key runners," Tyson noted.
The key runners Tyson is referring to are Brent Felnagle, Conor McCandless, Ned Fischer and Colin O'Neil, all sidelined with various medical issues.
"None of them will be back," Tyson said of this week. "You hope Ned Fischer can come back and things look positive, but it's still wait and see. It would be nice to have Colin O'Neil back by Plantes Ferry (next week). I don't see Conor McCandless or Brent Felnagle being back. It would be nice to have them back for the Bill Dellinger in a month. Then, at the end of the day can we get those guys back for the West Coast Conference which is the most meaningful meet. Redshirting is still a possibility for Brent and Conor. At the same time if they were healthy they would be in the mix with Troy, Willie and Nick and that's a pretty darn good team."
The women's team will still be without Lara Tuthill, but Ley said the biggest thing she took from the season opener is maturity.
"The biggest thing is we need to mature as racers. They are a pretty young crew that needs to become more confident with what they are doing and learn how to race in bigger meets." Ley said. "That's what we're using this week for. We talked about it that we're going to focus on a pretty generalized race plan and let's follow through with it. If we are going to make mistakes let's make them early so we can fix them."
Tyson will have three freshmen wearing the jersey this week. In addition to Fraley, Tyson is taking freshmen Zac Garrard and Henry Morris to Seattle this week. For Morris it will be a homecoming as he attended Seattle's Blanchet High.
"Garrard will go to Seattle and I like what he is doing. I like Morris who I added to the roster late. There will be three freshmen running in the jersey out of the 15 going to Seattle," Tyson said.
Tyson is trying to save the redshirt year for his other freshmen, although some more newcomers could get their opportunity next week at the Erik Anderson Invitational at Spokane's Plantes Ferry.
"A lot of them aren't going to wear the jersey yet. It's good to protect them. It's a little similar to what we did Kyle, Matt, Danny and Ian and it ended up being a wise thing with them not wearing the jersey. Now they end up helping the team even in this period when we have some key people sidelined. If those injuries persist we will count on those guys to help this team."
Ley isn't moving any of the newcomers into the line-up at this point, either.
"None of them are moving in at this point," Ley said of the freshmen. "We'll see most of those kids who weren't in a jersey next week at Plantes Ferry and give them a little bit longer to be ready to go."
Senior Catherine Theobald, who redshirted last spring's track season, has been sidelined all fall and will likely redshirt this fall.
"We'll probably redshirt Catherine. She'll be back for a fifth year and it makes sense to line it up and let her rebuild. The only way we wouldn't is if it looked like she was going to be in our top five and we could use her to score at the WCC. But I'm not sure if that's a valuable use of a year for her if she's going to be back and give her another year to get stronger," Ley noted.
Both coaches pick host University of Washington, which has swept the Sundodger the past six years, to again be the team to beat. The Washington men were ranked second in the Far West Regional preseason poll, while the UW women were ranked fifth nationally in the preseason Top 30. Gonzaga's women were ranked 14th and the Bulldog men 15th in the preseason regional rankings.
"Washington is a young team and probably brought in their best freshmen class in the history of the school. Along with a few of their returnees they are the team to beat," Tyson said.
Ditto Ley.
"Washington is the team. We'll see who they put in a jersey," she said of the Huskies. "For us it's a little bit of let's rub shoulders. If that's our goal down the road to be at that level, then let's find out what does it feel like and what do they do. Maggie (Jones) and Lauren (Bergam) are a couple of our people who should be able to mix up with some of their runners."
