Women’s Cross Country Wins Big Ten Championship
It had everything you could want in a sporting event — postseason drama, an upset of Michigan, and a Big Ten Championship brought home by the Nittany Lions.
The Nittany Lion women’s cross country team, ranked No. 15 in the nation, capped off an exciting regular season with a win against the field in the Big Ten Championship. All 14 Big Ten programs competed, headlined by the nation’s No. 2 team in Michigan. In addition to Penn State, three other ranked teams competed: No. 21 Michigan State, No. 22 Minnesota, and No. 30 Purdue.
Penn State’s finished three runners in the top nine: No. 4 Tori Gerlach, No. 6 Elizabeth Chikotas, and No. 9 Jillian Hunsberger. Tessa Barrett and Julie Kocjancic finalized the Nittany Lions’ score at 53, five ahead of the second-place Wolverines.
“I’m really proud of the way the women fought today,” Head Coach John Gondak told Penn State Athletics. “We knew it was going to be an incredible challenge to try and knock off Michigan who is the No. 2 team in the country. You know, we talked before the competition and I told them for us to win we need to put four women in the top-10 and our No. 5 needed to be within the top-25. From 1k into the race the women positioned themselves great and just fought and fought and came away with an incredibly tight victory over an outstanding Michigan squad.”
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