NEWVILLE, Pa. – The No. 25 Haverford College women's cross country team finished third at the NCAA Mideast Regional on Saturday. The Fords were topped by No. 1 Johns Hopkins (32 points) and No. 18 Elizabethtown (100 points) for the top two automatic qualifying spots. However, the Fords (150 points) did beat an upstart Carnegie Mellon (168 points) team and No. 23 Dickinson (178 points) to put themselves in very strong contention for an at-large bid as a team when the complete field is selected on Sunday.
Haverford's third place finish marked the 14th time in program history the Fords have placed among the top three teams with six runner-up finishes and now eight third-place showings after Saturday's results. The last time Haverford placed third was during the 2015 season.
Highlighting the team's success were Haverford seniors repeating their All-Mideast Region honors. Katie Sullivan and Amelia Keyser-Gibson each earned their third straight All-Mideast Region accolades. Sullivan placed 13th on Saturday with a time of 22:28.8, while Keyser-Gibson was 14th with a time of 22:30.6. With their honors, they become the first classmates in program history to have three cross country all-region accolades to their names.
They are the 11th and 12th three-time all-region performers in program history joining: Tamara Lave '90, Meredith Unger '97, Rachel Mosher '99, Kristen Wilson '03, Jane Steinemann '04, Prentiss Clark '05, Jane Weber '08 (four-time), Emily Lipman '12 (four-time), Emily Scott '14, and Nora Weathers '16.
Fellow senior Nicole Giannetti earned All-Mideast Region honors for the second straight season as she placed 34th overall in the field with a time of 23:16.3. Following her to the finish line was first year Hannah Doll (23:31.3) and junior Sophie Drew (23:37.1). That duo finished in 43rd and 46th place, respectively. Both of those runners were making their regional debut as Drew turned in a career-best 6,000 meter time on the very challenging course.
First year Hannah Yeakey (23:45.6) and sophomore Mckenna Krall (24:13.1) were the final two finishers for the Fords. Haverford's sixth and seventh finishers were also making their regional debuts as they crossed the finish line with respective 54th and 87th place finishes.
With eight regions in Division III, 16 schools automatically qualified for the NCAA Championships next weekend with 16 at-large bids to be decided on Sunday. By rule, the Fords must be the first team picked out of the Mideast Region, giving them a very likely chance of being selected to the NCAA Championship field. The official announcement of at-large teams and individuals will be officially announced tomorrow at 1 p.m. via a press release on NCAA.com.