MOREHEAD, Ky. — For just the sixth time in its history, the Morehead State men's and women's cross country teams will host the Ohio Valley Championship. The races will be held on the Eagle Trace Golf Course, the second time it will serve as the site of the event. Competition will take place on Saturday, with the men running an 8K at 9 a.m., followed by the women's 6K race at 10 a.m. It will be the second year the ladies will run that distance. An awards ceremony will be held at noon. The meet is free of charge.
At 6 p.m. on Friday, there will be a banquet at the Adron Doran University Center when the Male and Female Athletes and Freshmen of the Year will be presented.
After Saturday's races, the Athletes of the Championships, Coaches of the Year and the First-Team and Second-Team all-conference selections will be presented. The top seven finishers in each gender will be on the first team, with the next seven making the second team. The two individual winners will be recognized as the Athlete of the Championship.
The current forecast for start times are cloudy with temperatures around 70 degrees. However, expected rains on Friday may make for a muddy course.
MSU has previously hosted the championship in 1980, 1985, 1993, 2002 and 2013. From 1985-2002, the meet was held on the then-MSU owned old Sunny Brook Golf Course, while the 1980 event took place on another university property that is now named the Derrickson Agricultural Complex. In 1980, the men were sixth and the women fourth, in 1985 the men were fifth and the women sixth, in 1993 the men were third and the women fourth, in 2002 the men were fourth and the women fifth and in 2013 the men were third and the women ninth.
The course will begin at the driving range and wind through parts of holes No. 9 and one, then skirting along 18, before finishing back near the start. The path will be two kilometers long with the women making three loops and the men four.
"The course has some hills in it. I think it will bring some people back (to older formats), since people usually race on flag courses these days," Morehead State coach
Clay Dixon said. "We have been able to run here a couple times. I think we should have some advantage since we are not traveling at all, as opposed to some teams who have to travel seven-plus hours."
Morehead State last raced two weeks ago at the Angel Mounds Invitational in Evansville, Ind., where the women were seventh and the men were eighth. It has been one of best seasons in recent years for the two Eagle squads and coach
Clay Dixon believes his teams will be right in the midst of those contending for titles.
"I'm optimistic about how we stack up. The women, I think, have a good shot to do better than they have in years at the conference meet. I think they should be a top-half team," he said. "(For the) men, it will be close. I think teams four through nine will be within 40-50 points of each other, so it will come down to who is feeling good on the day."
This year, 11 schools will participate in the meet, up from 10 one season ago. In addition to Morehead State, Eastern Illinois, Lindenwood, Little Rock, Southeast Missouri, SIUE, Southern Indiana, Tennessee State, Tennessee Tech, UT Martin and newcomer Western Illinois will comprise the field. It will be the second largest number of teams in conference history, having peaked at 12 between 2012 and 2020.
Each team is allowed to enter up to 10 runners. Approximately, 110 are expected for each race.
Dixon's men's lineup will include fifth-year team members
Justin Chavez,
Kyle Embry and
Jarrett Forrest; along with seniors
Justin Bland,
Peyton Fairchild,
Wes Grogan,
Kyler Stewart and
Jacob Vogelpohl; junior
Ethan Vance and freshman
Armando Montes. The women's side will be made up of seniors
Isabella Copher and
Laikin Tarlton; juniors
Megan Bush,
Cloe Copas,
Lilly Gray,
Jennifer Ramirez and
Lucy Singleton; sophomores
Christiana Brittian and
Abby Taylor; and freshman
Taylor Allen. Senior
Toby Cook and sophomore
Casey Skaggs will be the alternates, in case of a last-minute scratch.
The Eagle men have run in three 8K races this fall. Vogelpohl's 25:28 at the Thundering Herd Invitational was the squad's quickest this season. The highest placing by a male was
Wes Grogan's second place at the Queen City Invitational, a meet in which MSU won the team title.
MSU's women have only run one 6K this season, the Angel Mounds Invitational. Singleton and Tarlton both clocked top-20 all-time performances at that meet, with Singleton's 22:24.1, the 10th-fastest and Tarlton's 22:43.00, the 15th-fastest at MSU for that distance. Tarlton also posted the 15th-fastest 5K for an Eagle woman earlier this year at Marshall's Thundering Herd Invite meet with a 18:21. Allen was second at the Queen City Invitational, the best individual showing this season.
At the Angel Mounds Invitational, Embry and Singleton were the team's top finishers. It was the first time this season Embry led the squad, while Singleton has achieved that feat twice. Other than Embry and Singleton, Grogan, Vogelpohl, Stewart, Allen and Tarlton have each topped the Eagles once.
"We have had some pretty high-intensity workouts the past two to three weeks," Dixon said. "We have tapered a little, but not too much, since we still have two more weeks of the season left."
It each of the last two years, MSU's men placed seventh. In the three previous campaigns they were fifth. Historically, the squad has been among the top contenders. In 2017, it finished second and, in 2016 it was third. Since the first championship in 1963, the Eagles have posted 32 top-four finishes and won the event in 1988 and 1995.
The women's competition first took place in 1979. Last year's Eagles finished seventh, having claimed sixth in the previous two iterations. In its history, the team has captured a top-four spot 16 times, including winning the 1979 and 2000 races. Both Eagle teams have had individual champions. Hall of Famers Jeff Faith and Karen Lutes won the titles in 1996 and 2001, respectively, while Susie Anderson brought home the crown in 2000.
The Eagles had a podium finisher last fall in
Garrett Watts, who took sixth in the men's race. It was the highest placing for an MSU man since Justin Moakler was fourth in 2017. For the women, Sierra Poppell in 2018, was the last MSU runner to medal. She finished in third.
Embry will be the lone team member competing for the fifth time. He was 38th in 2019 (26:19.6), 21st in 2020 (28:39.19), 25th in 2021 (26:10.3) and 16th last year (25:58.4). Fairchild, Forrest and Stewart will each be making their fourth appearance; while Bland and Chavez will be racing for their third time; with Vance and Vogelpohl running in their second race.
Copher and Tarlton are slated to compete for the fourth time, but just the second running a 6K at the meet. Tarlton finished 24th in 2020, 25th in 2021 and 33rd last year (23:53.2). Copher was 36th in 2020, 19th in 2021 and 71st in 2022 (26:44.4). Bush, Copas and Singleton will be running for the third time; while Brittian, Gray, Ramirez and Taylor will be toeing the line for their second race. Singleton has the best overall finish among the group, having placed 18th in 2021.
Fifteen MSU athletes competed in last year's meet. For the men, that group included: Embry, Stewart (37th in 26:44.6), Bland (51st in 27:09.7), Fairchild (57th in 27:24.9), Vance (66th in 27:56.0), Forrest (71st in 28:08.0) and Vogelpohl (did not finish). On the women's side, the entrants were: Singleton (22nd in 23:18.0), Tarlton, Bush (34th in 23:53.3), Brittian (56th in 24:48.9), Taylor (60th in 25:01.7), Copas (64th in 25:55.6), Ramirez (68th in 26:03.5) and Copher.
Eastern Illinois won both the men's and women's titles in 2022. It was the third straight team crown for the Panther men and the first in 11 years for the EIU women. Southern Indiana's Noah Hufnagel was the men's winner in 24:37.2, while his schoolmate Lauren Greiwe captured the women's race in 21:36.7. Neither of those athletes are entered on Saturday. The top returning runners who will compete are EIU's fifth-year student Adam Swanson and his schoolmate senior Mackenzie Aldridge, both of whom were third last year. Last year, 94 men and 86 women participated.
In the final 2022 men's team standings, EIU collected 65 points, followed by UT Martin (67), Southern Indiana (82), Tennessee Tech (101), Little Rock (112), Southeast Missouri (144), MSU (159), SIUE (179), Lindenwood (224) and Tennessee State (321). On the women's side, EIU scored 41 points, followed by Southern Indiana (42), Tennessee Tech (71), Southeast Missouri (91), Little Rock (138), UT Martin (150), MSU (186), SIUE (230), Lindenwood (250) and Tennessee State (328).
For the second consecutive year, no school enters regionally ranked by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association. According to available information, last fall was the only other time no team was ranked the week of the OVC meet.
Additional information about the meet can be found at the conference's championship homepage
https://ovcsports.com/news/2023/10/20/2023-ovc-cross-country-championship-to-be-contested-saturday.aspx, with live results available at the link
http://www.cfpitiming.com/2023_Cross_Country_Season/OVC_xc_2023/OVC_xc_2023.htm. Race photos will be available on the msueagles.com website in a gallery on each cross country team's schedule page.
MSU will conclude its season at the NCAA Southeast Regional on Friday, Nov. 10, at the Roger Milliken Center in Spartanburg, S.C. If the Eagles have any qualifiers for the NCAA Championship, they will advance to run at the Panorama Farms in Charlottesville, Va., on Saturday, Nov. 18.
