UNC women shift strategy for NCAAs

While the North Carolina women's cross country team's second-place finish in the ACC Championships might have been a disappointment, it wasn't necessarily surprising to the team.

"I knew that Duke had beaten us," said senior Alice Schmidt.

"They had an awesome race. You could tell within the first 1,000 meters of the 6,000-meter race that they had their top five or six girls in front of me, and I was running third for the team."

Duke finished with five runners in the top 10 of the 6K race. UNC runners Carol Henry and Erin Donohue finished second and third overall, respectively, in the race.

Schmidt, Jennie Sucher and Meghan Owen rounded out the top five for North Carolina.

"We knew it was going to be a tough battle with Duke, but our goal as a team was to try and win the ACC championship," said coach Michael Whittlesey. "Our girls stepped up and did a really great job. Duke was just better on that day."

The loss ended any hope for a consecutive Triple Crown title - winning the ACC cross country, indoor and outdoor track championships - but the Tar Heel women plan to redeem themselves against Duke at Saturday's NCAA regional meet in Greenville.

"I knew that we ran a pretty good race for that day," Schmidt said. "We had some injury problems. I don't think Duke is untouchable at regionals."

The men's team did not have aspirations as high as an ACC championship, but its 10th-place finish at the conference meet still fell short of preseason team goals.

The top five Tar Heel finishers for the men's 8K race were Jesse Rappole, Alex Ray, Tom Falvey, Brian McGovern and Matt Daly.

"We did not have the meet that we anticipated at the ACC championship," Whittlesey said. "But we go into the regional meet trying to bounce back off of a poor showing and try to learn something from what we did."

After this weekend's meet, the top two teams qualify for the NCAA Championships in Terre Haute, Ind. A team not in the top two can advance based on how many teams it has beaten during the regular season and what place it finished in at regionals.

For both UNC teams, in order to get better performances, they will have to change their strategy. The regional meet will be run on a relatively flat course, which will produce faster times, but every team has that advantage.

"We're trying to have our third, fourth, fifth and sixth runners all run together in the race," Schmidt said. "It's just better when you're running with your teammates. You just don't want to let them down.

"We're also hoping that at regionals the race will go out a little bit faster, which will string out Duke's top runners more."

The men's strategy is more long term and will benefit them not only this weekend, but in the upcoming indoor and outdoor track seasons.

"We just have to continue working on the consistency of competitive focus," Whittlesey said. "It's still a learning process and a physical maturity process that needs to occur."

Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.