Tomorrow. Homecoming. Litchfield Park?
Yes, Litchfield Park, 30 miles northwest of Tempe. Be sure to budget a hike over to Wigwam Golf Resort after an early breakfast before heading back down in time to tailgate for the 3:30 football game against Colorado.
Why? The Sun Devil cross-country team is hosting the first ever Pac-12 Championship of any kind. That alone is pretty historic, I’d say, and that’s not even considering the talent level of the field.
Though Pac-12 titles are on the line for the first time this weekend, the conference long dominated the national distance running landscape well before the recent expansion. In the conference, there are five men’s teams ranked in the top 25 and six women’s teams ranked in the top 16. Without question, this race will be a showcase for the best cross-country conference in the nation.
That is to say, there will be an abundance of superhuman runners competing in both the men’s 8,000m race at 9 a.m. and the women’s 6,000m race at 10 a.m.
“There are people in this race this weekend that you’ll probably see putting on a USA uniform and running in the Olympics in a few years,” women’s head coach Ryan Cole said. “Getting to see some of the best at such a fundamental activity — putting one foot in front of the other — is kind of cool.”
Headlining the men’s race are future stars such as UA’s Lawi Lalang and Stanford’s Chris Derrick. The women’s side, which is even more stacked than the men’s, includes notables such as Oregon’s Jordan Hasay, Washington’s Katie Flood, Cal’s Deborah Maier and Stanford’s Kathy Kroeger.
“You really get a sense of appreciation, because everyone has run before,” Cole said. “You know how difficult it can be to even break seven minutes for the mile… You can appreciate how hard (distance running) is.”
Indeed, at one point or another we all have been reduced to panting after running up just a few flights of stairs. Or sprinted the final stretch to class so as to not be late, only to sit down and discover sweat dripping from your brow.
“One of the great things about it is that people can relate,” Cole said. “There are a lot of people that can put on a pair of shoes and go out and run a mile.”
Oh, and the Sun Devils that will be competing tomorrow morning aren’t too shabby, either.
Look for juniors Darius Terry and Nick Happe to anchor the No. 25 men’s team. ASU is aiming to use the Pac-12 Championships as a springboard toward the all-important regional meet on Nov 12, where they can lock down an automatic bid to Nationals with a top two finish.
“We have two guys (Terry and Happe) that can give us some really nice front-running presence,” men’s head coach Louie Quintana said. “If we have a good showing at the conference meet, I think that will continue to swell our confidence, help us gain some more momentum and get us ready for the regional meet.”
Senior Lindsay Prescott leads the women, but it’s far from a one-woman act. Out of the ten Sun Devils toeing the line tomorrow, five are freshmen, including Shelby Houlihan, who is ranked third nationally among first-year harriers. With these youthful ASU women on the bubble to qualify for nationals, this meet is a huge test to see if the Sun Devils have what it takes to push the envelope down the stretch and garner a bid to the NCAAs.
Cole said ASU’s game plan is pretty simple: “Everybody has a role. Saturday, they have to do it.”
And I think an ASU fan’s game plan for Saturday is pretty simple, too: Breakfast. Litchfield Park. Lot 59. Sun Devil Stadium. Homecoming shenanigans peppered everywhere in between.
Reach the reporter at kjnewma2@asu.edu
