NC STATE & NAU WIN BACK-TO-BACK NCAA D1 CROSS COUNTRY CHAMPIONSHIPS
By David Monti, @d9monti
(c) 2022 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved – Used with permission.
(19-Nov) — The women of North Carolina State and the men of Northern Arizona University successfully defended their team titles at today’s NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships in Stillwater, Okla., the nation’s most competitive team running event. The Wolfpack, under head coach Laurie Henes, scored 114 points, a comfortable 26 ahead of second place New Mexico, and their top runner, Katelyn Tuohy, won the individual title. The Lumberjacks, under coach Mike Smith, won their sixth title in the last seven years, but only just. Tied with Oklahoma State University with 83 points, NAU won on the tie-breaker –where the head-to-head finishes of the top-2 team’s five scoring runners are considered– 3-2. The individual title went to Stanford’s Charles Hicks, the first Stanford man to ever win an individual NCAA cross country title.
TUOHY COMES FROM BEHIND
As expected, Florida’s Parker Valby went for the individual win right from the gun. Valby, who won both the SEC and South Region titles this season, powered away from the main field in just the first kilometer and built a 12-second lead by the 4 km mark of the 6 km race. Running with warming packs in her gloves –but no socks which left her feet numb in the sub-freezing temperatures– Valby was trying to build up the biggest lead she could on Tuohy who is known for her closing speed.
“I just wanted to go for it,” Valby told commentator John Anderson on the ESPNU broadcast. Â “I know I don’t have as good of a kick as Katelyn so that I knew I had to shoot my shot.”
Tuohy –the ACC and South Region champion who, like Valby, is undefeated this season– decided late in the fourth kilometer it was time to close the gap. She left the main group and chipped away at Valby’s lead.
“We talked about beforehand if she went out fast from the gun to stay back and kind of work with the pack to catch her,” Tuohy said in her post-race broadcast interview.  “Once we went through about 3-K I was like, the gap’s a little bigger than I like. So I kind of made the surge to catch her.”
Just before the 5-K mark, Valby’s lead was down to six seconds. Tuohy kept digging, and with about 500 meters remaining in the race Tuohy caught Valby. The two sophomores remained together for just a second before Tuohy started to…
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