BATON ROUGE, La. — The LSU cross country team will face its most difficult challenge of the season on Monday as both the men’s and women’s squads head to Athens, Ga., for the SEC Championships.
Run at the UGA Golf Course, the conference meet will kick off at 8 a.m. (CST) with the men’s 8K race and will conclude at the 9 a.m. with the women’s 6K run.
LSU looks to improve upon its finishes from a year ago, as the Tigers finished eight overall and the Lady Tigers were ninth.
“We are prepared as we can be for the team that we have this season,” said LSU cross country coach Mark Elliott. “I am expecting a good showing from both the men’s and women’s teams. I think a top-six performance from the men and a top-eight showing from the women would be a success.”
“The women’s team is still very young and the men have some more experience so that’s where the expectations become a little greater.”
Perennial national power, Arkansas, enters the meet as the defending conference champion in both the men’s and women’s races. The Razorbacks and Ladybacks will be a challenge to uncrown, as the men have won 12 consecutive SEC titles and the women have claimed the last five conference crowns.
Neither the men’s or women’s individual champions from a year ago will be back to defend their titles, but Kentucky’s Thomas Morgan and Tennessee’s Brooke Novak will be looked to as favorites as they enter the meet with the SEC’s top times in the men’s 8K and the women’s 6K, respectively, this season.
The Tigers will look to their anchor, junior Jimmy Wiggins, to lead the pack once again on Monday as he strives to become the first Tiger athlete since Likhaya Dayile in 2001 to earn All-SEC accolades. Wiggins enters the meet with the conference’s ninth-best 10K time of the season and has recorded three individual top 15 finishes this year.
He will be supported by fellow juniors Nick Accardo, Matt Carroll, Jarett Roche’ and Ben Shumaker, sophomores Andrew Huston, Roland LeBlanc and freshmen Jace Gohres who are also scheduled to run.
On the women’s side junior Katie Denton will lead a young Lady Tiger squad as she looks to garner All-SEC accolades for the first time in her career. Denton has crossed the finish line first for the Lady Tigers in each of the five races in which she has run this season.
She will be joined by senior Katrina Flanders, junior Sarah Bailey, sophomores Michelle Hymel, Megan Kliebert and Sarah Colosimo, and freshmen Katherine Accardo and Jennifer Radecker, who are all expected to run for the Lady Tigers.
Following the SEC Championships, both the men’s and women’s teams will take next weekend off before traveling to Waco, Texas, for the NCAA South Central Regional Championships, on Nov. 15.