WOMEN'S CROSS COUNTRY COMPETES IN NCAA REGIONAL
Nov. 12, 2011
BRUNSWICK, Maine. - The Emmanuel College Women's Cross Country Team wrapped up the 2011 season by competing at the highly competitive NCAA New England Regional Meet on Saturday morning. The 6-kilometer event was hosted by Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine and featured 51 women's teams racing for the New England Championship. No. 3-ranked Middlebury College defeated No. 1 Williams College for the women's team crown, winning by just five points. This is the fourth-straight New England women's team title for the Panthers, who shared the top spot with MIT in 2009.
Williams sophomore Chiara Del Piccolo won the women's race, covering the 6-kilometer course in 20:52.43, over 14 seconds ahead of runner-up Randelle Boots of Wellesley College. Piccolo finished 16th in last year's meet at Williams. But the Panthers had three runners among the top eight overall, in fourth-place Margo Cramer, fifth-place Addie Tousley and eighth-place Chelsea Ward-Wallers, and all seven of its runners among the first 28 to cross the finish line.
No. 5 MIT took third place with 134 points, followed by No. 14 Amherst in fourth (142), with No. 23 Tufts rounding out the top five NCAA-hopeful squads with 181 points. Boots led the Blue, ranked in a three-way tie for 10th place in the latest New England rankings, to a surprise sixth-place finish as a team.
The Emmanuel women gained some great experience competing against several of the nation's top teams. Several Saints cut multiple minutes off their 6k times from the NCAAs last season. The Saints' top three runners finished within 8 seconds of each other. Emmanuel was led by junior captain Joslyn DelSignore (Taunton, Mass.), who covered the 6k course in 25:41 for 219th place, out of the field of 353 total runners. DelSignore cut exactly two minutes off her time from last year's NCAA meet. Sophomore Danielle Martin (York, Me.) finished second for the Saints with a time of 25:48, also cutting nearly two minutes off her time from the 2010 regional. Freshman Ameena Dye (Syracuse, N.Y.) ran third for Emmanuel in a time of 25:49.
Sophomore Molly Metivier (Keene, N.H.) scored 4th for the Saints with a time of 26:29. Sophomore Meaghan Mauer (South Hadley, Mass.) rounded out Emmanuel's top five with a 27:32 finish. Also competing in the regional were junior Julie Young (Derry, N.H.) and sophomore Amy DeNuzzio (Salem, N.H.), who finished in 27:36 and 27:56, respectively. Young's time was a two-minute improvement from her sophomore year.
The Saints' 2011 Cross Country season is now in the books. Many of the Emmanuel's runners will gear up for the winter and spring Indoor and Outdoor Track & Field seasons. The Saints will open the 2011-12 Indoor Track & Field season on December 3rd at the Northeastern University Invitational.