Marquette Women's Cross Country Team Heads to Nationals

Susan Barth

Milwaukee-- The Conference USA Champion Marquette women's cross country team received an at-large bid this afternoon to qualify for the NCAA Division I Nationals meet which will be held at noon EST Monday, Nov. 25th in Terre Haute, Ind. The squad finished 7th at the Great Lakes Regional Championships, missing an automatic bid. It did receive one of 13 at-large bids distributed throughout the nation. Due to the large number of nationally-ranked teams in the region, the Great Lakes region received seven of the 13 bids.

Coach Dave Uhirch says that although he was disappointed in how the squad placed at regionals, he knows the team is ready to run its best race of the season.

"I don't think we ran that well last weekend and we still made it," Uhrich said. "That's an advantage. Some of the teams had to run their best race of the year to get there, and it's hard to turn around nine days later do it again. We didn't run our best race so we're ready to run our best race at nationals."

The Marquette runners are: senior Jessie Swan (West Allis, Wis.), senior Susan Barth (Bluffton, Ind.), senior Jackie Swan (West Allis, Wis.), freshman Jodi Jakubek (Ketchikan, Ala.), junior Jamie Haro (Brookfield, Wis.), freshman Alli Sauer (Goshen, Ky.), and either freshman Terri Emond (Wyoming, Minn.) or freshman Susie Emond (Wyoming, Minn.). Susie Emond is questionable due to back injury and her twin sister Terri will run if Susie is unable.

The team has been ranked at high as No. 13 this season, but dropped out of the rankings after the regional race.

There will be 31 teams competing in the 6-K race and Uhrich is confident that the team will finish in the top-20.



"Partly what happened last weekend was we were overconfident," Uhrich said. "After winning conference, sometimes it's hard to run a really good race three weeks in a row. We'll be looking at Nationals to show that really isn't where our team is at. I'm looking for us to be definitely in the top-20."

Uhrich is looking to the seniors to provide leadership for the team.

"The biggest benefit is that this is their third-straight trip to nationals," he said. "So that is going to be a big help having them with their experience. Both Jessie and Susan, if they run their very best, have a chance at being All-Americans."

Marquette will be competing against Notre Dame, Michigan, Columbia, Providence, Georgetown, Villanova, Missouri, Northwestern, Brigham Young, Colorado, Tennessee, Florida State, Arkansas, Texas, Wake Forest, North Carolina State, Stanford, Arizona State, Michigan State, Virginia, Northern Arizona, Duke, North Carolina, Indiana, Ball State, Wisconsin, William & Mary, UCLA, Penn State and Washington.

Indiana State is hosting the race and results can be found at: http://web.indstate.edu/athletic/cross/2002ncaaUPDATE.html