Season Review: 2018 Michigan Women's Cross Country
12/17/2018 1:21:00 PM | Women's Cross Country
NCAA Championships: Fourth (213 points)
NCAA Great Lakes Regional: First (46 points)
Big Ten Championships: First (57 points)
Driven by one of the deepest and most cohesive lineups of any team in the country, the University of Michigan women's cross country team had a banner 2018 that included national and Big Ten glory.
While head coach Mike McGuire's Wolverine women may have flown under the radar for much of the regular season, they consistently proved their mettle when it mattered: in the postseason. Led by All-Americans Camille Davre and Avery Evenson, as well as Big Ten Freshman of the Year Anne Forsyth, the Wolverines finished fourth at the NCAA Championships after scoring decisive victories at the Big Ten Championships and NCAA Great Lakes Regional.
Michigan's success came as those three -- who took turns as the Wolverines' No. 1 runner during the postseason -- were bolstered by one of the best supporting casts in all of the NCAA. Never too far behind were Hannah Meier, Claire Borchers, Anna West and Jessi Larson, all of whom finished top-100 for U-M at the national meet.
The 2018 season was one of both storybook endings and new beginnings. Evenson and Borchers, with no track eligibility remaining, both brought their Michigan careers to a fitting close, while Meier concluded her final cross country season. At the other end of the spectrum, Davre and Forsyth were the first- and third-best freshmen at NCAAs, with Larson also among the meet's top-10 freshmen.
Team Highlights
• With victories at smaller invitationals at Nebraska (Sept. 15) and Louisville (Sept. 29) to start the season, the Wolverines -- ranked No. 13 in the preseason -- showed hints of what was to come later in the season with strong and deep pack running, but still remained inconspicuous nationally as much of the rest of the nation competed against one another in higher-profile invitationals.
• Michigan had its first national breakout performance in a runner-up finish in the Pre-National Invitational "White Race" (Oct. 13) on the same Wisconsin course that would host the NCAA Championships a month later. Not only did the Wolverines display incredible depth -- they were the only team in the field with seven top-60 finishers -- but Evenson and Meier emerged as frontrunners with eighth- and 12th-place finishes, respectively.
• Already a formidable opponent with Evenson and Meier leading one of the nation's deepest rosters, Michigan unleashed a secret weapon at the Big Ten Championships (Oct. 28) in Forsyth. With both Evenson and Forsyth -- making her collegiate debut after a pair of unattached victories -- running at the front of the race throughout, and a strong surge over the final mile and a quarter, the Wolverines took down Michigan State, 57-75, to win their third-consecutive conference team title. Evenson wound up third for First-Team All-Big Ten honors, while Forsyth was eighth for second-team and Big Ten Freshman of the Year honors and Meier was 11th for a second-team award.
• The Wolverines were even stronger at the NCAA Great Lakes Regional (Nov. 9) en route to a fourth-consecutive team title, 46-82, over Wisconsin. Forsyth and Evenson led the way in third- and fourth-place, respectively, as the Wolverines were the only team in the region with five top-25 finishers -- all of whom earned All-Region distinctions. The performance not only netted them the win, but also their 17th-consecutive berth to the NCAA Championships (third-longest active streak in the nation).
• Despite their two convincing postseason victories, the Wolverines still entered the NCAA Championships (Nov. 17) ranked No. 6 in the country and outside much of the national discussion surrounding which teams would make the podium as the top-four teams in the nation.
• Running on the Wisconsin course that had been covered by an overnight snowfall, the Wolverines exceeded their pre-meet expectations. Davre had the best race of her young Michigan career to finish 29th -- after coming through in 90th after the first checkpoint -- and was joined as an All-American by Evenson. Not too far behind were Forsyth in 46th, Meier in 53rd, Borchers in 79th, West in 92nd and Larson in 99th. Only national champion Colorado matched Michigan with seven top-100 finishers -- a feat Michigan itself had only accomplished once before in 1994, when the field was only 22 teams deep instead of 31 as presently constituted. No team in the top-10 had its five scorers more closely grouped than Michigan with only 28.3 seconds separating Davre from Borchers.
• From start to finish, Michigan improved nine spots from its preseason No. 13 rank to its fourth-place result at NCAAs. Among top-10 teams at nationals, only eighth-place Notre Dame (+15 spots from the preseason) outperformed its rank more than Michigan. This was the 16th consecutive year that Michigan had started the season top-30; it was the 10th time during that span that Michigan has outperformed its preseason rank.
Evenson
Davre
Forsyth
Hannah Meier
Individual Highlights
• Evenson both started and finished her Michigan career on the podium with All-America honors, becoming just the ninth woman in school history to earn the distinction twice or more in her career. In 2016, she was 18th at NCAAs as Michigan's No. 2 runner for that national runner-up squad, and she was 38th at NCAAs as Michigan's No. 2 runner again in 2018. As Michigan's No. 1 or No. 2 runner in all of her meets this season, she bounced back in a big way from a disappointing 2017 campaign that saw her finish 157th at NCAAs. That 121-spot improvement was one of the biggest year-to-year gains of any All-American in 2018.
• Davre started and finished the 2018 season as Michigan's No. 1 runner. She won the season-opening Michigan Open in her first collegiate race after missing last year due to injury, and concluded the fall as the top freshman in the country with a 29th-place NCAA finish. Not only was her standing as the nation's best freshman impressive, but how she accomplished it was arguably more so. At the two-kilometer checkpoint of the six-kilometer race, she was in 90th place. Over the next four kilometers she moved up 61 spots to finish top-40 for All-America honors. No one in the field moved up farther to become an All-American, and in doing so, she posted the third-highest finish ever by a first-year Michigan runner.
• Forsyth was a revelation for the Wolverines' scoring lineup when she made her debut at the Big Ten Championships. Though this postseason was her first collegiate experience, she ran fearlessly from the front of all three races in which she competed. Among all freshmen at NCAAs, her 46th-place finish ranked third behind only Davre and Arkansas' Katrina Robinson, and she wound up tied for No. 7 on the list of best finishes by Michigan freshmen with teammate Maddy Trevisan.
• Finally able to overcome a long series of injuries and complete a season fully healthy, Meier had the best season of her career for the Wolverines and made a name for herself as a lethal late-race kicker. While Evenson and Forsyth went to the front early and stayed there, Meier would often bide her time toward the middle of the pack and use her national-caliber mid-distance speed to make up ground late. She moved up 12 spots in the final two kilometers of NCAAs to finish 53rd, 14 spots over that distance at regionals to finish ninth; and 13 positions in the last 2K at Big Tens to finish 11th.
• Borchers, competing in her final season of Michigan eligibility, embodied the "Those who stay" mentality espoused in Ann Arbor. After finishing 166th for the Wolverines in their national runner-up 2016 season, she was 98th at nationals a year ago and 79th in 2018 as the third-best No. 5 runner in the field. She concluded her Michigan career with her 13th consecutive race in Michigan's five-woman scoring lineup. Of the women who competed in all seven of the Wolverines' main competitions this year (excluding the EMU Fall Classic), only Borchers and Davre were top-five for Michigan in all of them.
• Though Michigan bids a bittersweet farewell to scorers Evenson, Meier and Borchers, the future is still very bright for the Wolverines. With Davre, Forsyth and Larson all finishing top-100 at the NCAA Championships, the Wolverines were the only team with more than one top-100 freshman. Those three are set to return next year along with 92nd-place West -- an All-American for Baylor in 2017 -- as well as several other talented runners who likely would have made the seven-woman NCAA lineup for almost any other school at the championships. Kathryn House was three times a top-seven finisher for the Wolverines, and Alice Hill -- in her first full season of cross country -- showed flashes of brilliance with a win in the Open Race at Pre-Nationals. The next group of first-year Wolverines will also be added into the mix, including Michigan high school cross country champions Olivia Theis (redshirt) and Ericka VanderLende.
Honors and Awards
Camille
Davre
Avery
Evenson
Anne
Forsyth
Hannah
Meier
USTFCCCA All-America
Camille Davre
Avery Evenson
USTFCCCA All-Region
Anne Forsyth
Avery Evenson
Hannah Meier
Camille Davre
Claire Borchers
Great Lakes Region Coach of the Year
Mike McGuire
First-Team All-Big Ten
Avery Evenson
Second-Team All-Big Ten
Anne Forsyth
Hannah Meier
Big Ten Freshman of the Year
Anne Forsyth
Big Ten Coach of the Year
Mike McGuire
Academic All-Big Ten (19)
Sydney Badger, Sr., Movement Science
Audrey Belf, Sr., Movement Science
Claire Borchers, Sr., International Studies / Spanish
Haley Click, So., Business Administration
Meg Darmofal, Sr., Movement Science
Camille Davre, So., Undeclared
Micaela DeGenero, Jr., Computer Science
Alice Hill, So., Undeclared
Kathryn House, Jr., Sport Management
Carola Jansohn, So., Undeclared
Kayla Keane, Sr., Movement Science
Mary Kate McNamara, Sr., Economics
Haley Meier, Sr., Elementary Education
Jena Metwalli, Jr., Public Policy
Lexi Munley, So., Business Administration
Jacalyn Overdier, So., Movement Science
Faith Reynolds, Sr., Public Health
Julia Sullivan, So., Undeclared
Maddy Trevisan, Jr., Mechanical Engineering
Players Mentioned
