by Alan Babbitt
The 10th-ranked Hope College women's cross country team is determined to flourish on a course the Flying Dutch know extremely well.
The Great Lakes Regional and Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association champions are racing at the NCAA Division III national championships on Saturday, Nov. 20, at E.P. Sawyer State Park in Louisville, Kentucky.
The 6K race starts at noon.
"We love the course. We've been down there a couple of times a year from the past 10, 12 years," head coach Mark Northuis said. "Our runners know the nooks and crannies of the course. They feel comfortable. We run well here. I think that's really to our advantage."
Ths is the Flying Dutch's 11th consecutive trip to nationals as a team and the 18th overall.
NCAA Championships History
Hope qualified by winning the November 13 Great Lakes Regional with a team score of 98 points. The Flying Dutch were one of 10 regional champions and automatic qualifiers.
The field for this year's national championships will be 32 teams, including 22 at-large teams.
"We could finish anywhere from eighth place to 16th place," Northuis said. "It's going to come down to where our fourth-, fifth- and sixth-place runners finish for us and who runs in those places.
"I think the target is off of our backs. We sort of carried it last weekend and also at the conference meet. We can run a little bit freer now and do what we want to be able to do. We can just run our own style."
Junior Ana Tucker (Midland, Michigan / H.H. Dow) leads the Flying Dutch. The exercise science major has finished runner-up in her last two races: the Great Lakes Regional and the October 29 MIAA Championships.
Tucker was one of four Hope runners to claim all-region honors, along with senior English education major Jacinda Cole (Holland, Michigan (Holland, Michigan / West Ottawa), junior communication major Ellie Jankowski (Granger, Indiana / Pennsylvania), and sophomore Rebecca Markham (Hoffman Estates, Illinois / Fremd).
All four are scheduled to run at nationals, along with junior Heleyna Tucker (Midland, Michigan / H.H. Dow), junior Anna Mason of Zeeland, Michigan (Libertas Christian), and sophomore Libby Gorman (Traverse City, Michigan / St. Francis(.
