#8 Gopher Women Face Strong Big Ten Field

When I wrote Gopher women's coach Gary Wilson this week and suggested that a very good team would finish 4th at the Big Ten Women's Cross Country Championships in Columbus, Ohio on Sunday he was quick to correct me.

"A very good team is going to end up 7th in the Big Ten," the Minnesota Track and Field inductee-elect emphasized. "Right now Penn State is ranked 26th [in the nation] but is much, much better than that. It is one tough conference this year. It might be more balanced than last year. As you might remember, Illinois finished 5th in the Big Ten and then placed 8th at the NCAA meet in 2006."

The conference not only features seven top-30 teams according to the NCAA rankings, but four squads that are in the NCAA top-10. The Big Ten squads stack up like this in the latest NCAA poll: #6 Michigan, #7 Michigan State, #8 Minnesota, #10 Illinois, #18 Iowa, #21 Wisconsin, and #26 Penn State.

A team will need to do things right to succeed.

"If any team is going to win, they have to have a very small spread between their first and fifth," Wilson surmised, "and I sincerely believe that a team's 6th and 7th runner will tip the scale this year."

Could it be the Gophers?

"The good thing for us is that, after our top four, we have about five runners who could be our fifth on any given day. We have the most depth and talented depth that we have ever had," Wilson said.

Wilson told DtB that his group is healthy going into the meet.

"Everyone is in tip-top shape both mentally and physically," he said. "I think that freshman Nikki Swenson is really starting to get her collegiate running legs under her. Ladia [Albertson-Junkans] is also getting better and better every week.

Swenson finished 4th overall in the Open race at the Pre-National mee in Terre Haute, Indiana two weeks ago with a time that would have placed her 5th on the Gopher varsity. Albertson-Junkans, a two-time all-American harrier for the Gophers, has battled injury this season and has, so far, run further back in the maroon pack than has been typical.

To hear Wilson tell it, being a strong team in the middle of a strong conference is exactly where the Gopher women would prefer to be.

"We do not try to downplay the pressure," he said. "We embrace it and have everyone understand that they are ready for the fight and they must establish themselves in the first three minutes of the race."

The gun fires for the Big Ten Championships at 9:45 on Sunday.