Sophomores lead Syracuse through dominant opening weekend

Though they’re just beginning their second season in Syracuse, the sophomores carried the Orange in its opening weekend.

The men’s and women’s cross country teams dominated the Harry Lang Invitational on Saturday in Hamilton, N.Y., thanks to a pair of sophomores.

Margo Malone not only finished before anyone else on the women’s team, but also before every other female runner. And Malone wasn’t the only Orange runner to finish first. Redshirt sophomore Juris Silenieks won the men’s section.

Coming into this meet, assistant coach Raynee DeGrio was confident the women could compete as well as they did last year despite losing a handful of key runners.

“Sarah (Pagano) was a really good athlete, and she contributed a lot for the team,” DeGrio said. “So it’s definitely hard to fill a void like that.”

But if one meet means anything, the Orange is on its way.

Four out of the five fastest women on Saturday were underclassmen, including the top two runners. Malone finished two spots and 13 seconds ahead of sophomore Brianna Nerud.

Last year, Malone might not have looked like someone who would win the first meet of this season. In the three meets she placed in, Malone finished 31st, 135th, and 6th respectively.

“We are seeing a lot of girls we wouldn’t have expected to be in one of those top positions,” DeGrio said.

In another surprise move, junior Katherine Fleischer didn’t run in the first meet. Fleishcher finished second at last year’s Harry Lang Invitational and 31st overall at the NCAA regional championship. Despite the fact she didn’t run, Fleischer maintains a leadership role on the young team.

“It feels good (to be back),” Fleischer said. “It’s helped some of the girls to step up and take leadership, too. There are a bunch of girls that everyone looks up to.”

While the women have a lot of new names and faces finishing the quickest on their squad, the men don’t have quite the same amount, but still saw a strong performance from its youngest athletes.

The fastest 11 men to race Saturday were all from Syracuse. Six were underclassmen, led by Silenieks.
But the difference between the men’s and women’s team is the men have more upperclassmen they can rely on to piece together a winning squad. While the women’s team did almost as well as the men this weekend, it doesn’t have as much experience.

The women’s team might be younger, DeGrio said, but there are still upperclassmen that can help the team succeed.

“The girls that have been around a lot like (senior) Alexandra Clinton and Jessie Petersen, they’ve been around for a while,” DeGrio said, “they know our program and are definitely leading us by example.”