The No. 27 Duke men's team finished ninth, and the No. 16 women's team finished sixth this weekend at the Great American Cross Country Festival in Cary, N.C. But an asthma attack and a couple "rough" performances prevented Duke from having a spectacular day.
However, there were a few very impressive individual performers who took full advantage of the spotlight.
Amidst a race featuring nine nationally ranked schools, junior Michael Hatch placed 14th overall with a time of 26:11.8 on the 8-K course.
"I would classify what Michael Hatch did as an All-American type effort," said men's and women's coach Norm Ogilvie. "That's a new step up for him; he wasn't running at that level last year. He showed he's ready to run with the best athletes in the country."
Freshman Keith Krieger was the second Blue Devil to cross the finish line, to the delight of his coach.
"Keith beat a lot of freshman who had beaten him in high school before," Ogilvie said. "It was a great, great effort for Keith Krieger----stepping up to be our second man in just his second race for Duke. It showed he's really ready to rock this year."
The men's team would have had a far better overall finish if Nick Schneider and Alex Romero ran as well as they did two weeks ago in Virginia--both started out aggressively, but faded towards the end of the race, according to Ogilvie.
During the women's race, Duke sophomore Natasha Roetter, who was the Blue Devil's top finisher at the Lou Onesty Invitational two weeks ago, suffered an asthma attack and withdrew from the race.
Sophomore Sally Meyerhoff turned in Duke's best performance, finishing 16th overall. But perhaps the brightest spot for the Blue Devils was freshman Elle Pishny. Pishny was the second Blue Devil to cross the finish line, and claimed 33rd overall.
"Elle wasn't regarded as a star in any sense on the national scene," Ogilvie said. "But with what she did on Friday, she's definitely one of the nation's top freshman right now. That was extremely encouraging." The strength of the women's team is its depth. Next week at the Notre Dame Invitational, Roetter will compete along with a group of runners who rested during the race Friday. This luxury insures that Duke will have fresh legs at Notre Dame, and throughout the rest of the season. Although last Friday's performance was not as successful as it could have been, Ogilvie is still thinking big things for the cross country program.
"I think both programs would like to challenge for the ACC title," Ogilvie said. "Not necessarily win the ACC title, but challenge for it. And both teams would like to be in the mix at nationals as well. Both teams feel like on a good day they can be a top-10 team."
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