On Friday, Nov. 14, Villanova’s women’s cross country team punched its ticket to the NCAA National Championships for the first time since 2021. The Wildcats finished fourth in the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional in Bethlehem, PA.
The men’s team placed third overall, with sophomore Charlie Moore and junior CJ Sullivan qualifying individually for the NCAA National Championships this upcoming weekend.
“The whole goal of the regional meet was to run well enough to qualify for the NCAA championship,” women’s head coach Gina Procaccio said. “We knew we just had to go out there and be solid, and we would probably get an at-large bid. And so that’s what they did.”
The women scored 78 total points, finishing just two points behind third-place Penn State. The top four teams, West Virginia (56), Georgetown (62), Penn State (76), Villanova (78), were separated by 22 points. For the first time since 2018, Villanova had four of its runners receive all-region honors and recorded the lowest score for a fourth-place team in 15 years.
Junior Tilly O’Connor placed fifth in a field of 215 runners, achieving her fourth-straight sub-20-minute finish with a time of 19:41.8, marking the seventh-fastest 6K time in women’s program history.
“[O’Connor] has made an incredible improvement this year,” Procaccio said. “I think she was pretty fired up about not being in the top seven last year… and now she’s been our number one runner the last three meets.”
The other scoring runners included graduate student Nikki Vanasse (19:49.2) in 11th, graduate student Margaret Carroll (19:55.6) in 15th and senior Amelia Arrieta (20:03.0) in 18th. All three showed major improvement from their past times, moving up a combined 80 places from last year’s competition.
“This is a total team effort,” Procaccio said. “We all kind of focus on what we need to do to move this team through the ranks and get to the national level. That was the goal the whole way.”
Rounding out the scoring five was sophomore Rosie Shay in 29th with a time of 20:27.6.
Freshman Zoe Mosher (20:47.6) and freshman Sophia McInnes (21:30.3) finished 36th and 69th, respectively, both placing in the top third of competitors.
“There’s only one week between the two races,” Procaccio said. “This week is about rest and getting recovered, and then getting out there next week and seeing where we belong.”
The men finished with 84 total points for their ninth consecutive top-four finish at regionals. The men came in third place, 21 points behind runner-up Georgetown (63). Four of the team’s scoring runners, Moore, S received all-region honors.
“We had a rocky start,” men’s head coach Marcus O’Sullivan said. “They were going one way for the first half of the season, and they rallied… and turned it around and came back in the right direction at the end of the season.”
Two of Villanova’s scoring runners placed in the top 10. Moore came in seventh of 201 competitors with a time of 29:37.9, moving to ninth on Villanova’s all-time 10K finishes list.
Sullivan (29:52.3) finished 10th, moving up three places from his performance last year at regionals.
“I think for [Sullivan] to make the nationals, that’s a big jump forward for him,” O’Sullivan said. “For [Moore], individually, he had a really good meet for himself.”
Following closely behind was junior Bailey Habler (30:09.8) in 12th, sophomore Ben Thomas (30:30.3) in 25th and graduate student Devon Comber (30:34.4) in 30th. Villanova saw just a 55.5-second split between its five scoring runners.
Sophomore Jack Fenlon (31:01.5) and junior Nick Sullivan (31:10.8) placed 46th and 53rd, respectively.
“I think there were some really positive things to take away from Friday,” O’Sullivan said. “We had two, almost three guys qualify individually, so I think we have the makings of a good future with this group.”
The women’s team, along with Moore and Sullivan, will now prepare for the NCAA Championships, held in Madison, WI, on Saturday, Nov. 22.
