NAIA Invitationals Will Also Have Some of the Top Teams

Published by Adam Schneider/RunnerSpace.com/college on October 21, 2015

With the big NCAA D1 cross country meets last weekend we will see another limited activity weekend for Division 1 athletes. Instead we have a rich non-D1 schedule.  NCAA D2 will have it’s heavy weekend of conference championships. 

D2 men’s #1 (#3 for women) Grand Valley State and women’s #1 Hillsdale will race in the GLIAC Championships in Milford, Michigan on October 24th.  The ultra-competitive RMAC Championships will be in  Colorado Springs, Colorado featuring #3 Colorado Mines and #4 Adams State in the men’s competition and #2 Adams State versus #6 Western State in the women’s competition. 

#5 Alaska-Anchorage men (#7 women) will compete in the GNAC Championships against an usual deep conference on October 24th in Bellingham, Washington. The CCAA championships will be in San Francisco this year and Chico State will attempt to extend it’s conference championship streaks of 13 consecutive for men and seven for women. 

The NAIA Great Lakes Cross Country Challenge will include perennial powers  (#6 men and #18 women) Oklahoma City, (#2 women and #16 men) Aquinas, (#4 women and #14 men) Taylor, #6 Olivet Nazarene, (#9 men and #10 women) Indiana Wesleyan, (#3 men and #12 women) St Francis, and (#12 men) Indiana Tech. #1 men’s (and #17 women) team Southern Oregon will compete at the Beaver Classic along with Concordia.  

NCAA D1 teams are coming into the meets where they will definitely run their top runners. Many D1 coaches are trying to guide their athletes into the big meets without too many injuries. For so many runners the conference championships will be the debut or a place where they will start putting themselves on the line. It is the put-up time of the year. Last year we only saw Sean McGorty run at Pac-12 Championships and NCAA D1 championships and he helped the team to a second place finish at NCAAs.