ANALYSIS OF PAC CHAMPIONSHIPS

First, congratulations must be given to Coach Sean Severson (updated biography here) who was named PAC Mens Coach of the Year and PAC Womens Coach of the Year. Severson took a womens team with only three of the top ten from last year, and still won the womens meet by 44 points over a team that had their top five returning. The men won by 21 points over a vastly improved Washington & Jefferson team, which ran a fine race today. Congratulations for a fine job to coach Mark FitzPatrick for a job well done. The Grove City men had an impressive spread of 40 seconds for their top five.
For the Grove City women, this was their 19th consecutive PAC Championship. The men have won 17 consecutive titles.
Womens Race:
Winning the race today, for her fourth consecutive win was junior Kristen Carter, who ran 22:52 for the 6k course. Carter was named MVP for the second consecutive season. Also named First Team All-PAC were Julia Seward, a junior who is having a very fine season, who was second today in 23:05; freshman Emily Pierce, fourth in 24:10; freshman Brigitte Fryan, fifth in 24:16; and freshman Jessica Vernon, seventh in 24:39. Second Team All-PAC honors went to sophomore Rachel Nelson, eighth overall in 24:47; and senior Sarah Sharp tenth in 24:49. Since the top fourteen qualify for all-PAC honors, more GCC runners would have been so-named but for a maximum of seven runners who can score and take honors. Amanda Hewitt was twelfth in 25:06 and Rachael Smith was fourteenth in 25:19.
Mens Race:
In the mens race, freshman Garrett Cichowitz finished third in 27:29 and was named First Team All-PAC. Joining Cichowitz of the First team were freshman Gordon Grob, fourth in 27:48, junior Daniel Spaulding (last year’s MVP coming back from a mid-season injury with a fine run), fifth in 27:52; junior Timothy Su, sixth in 28:00; and junior Brett Kelly, seventh in 28:09. Second Team honors wenr to seniorJoey Cortez, eighth in 28:17 and sophomore Zach Foster ninth in 28:21. As with the women, two others would have made all-league honors but for the limit of runners from a team. Thus, Jeremiah Patterson was tenth in 28:28; Frankie Hourigan was eleventh in 28:39; Cordell Oberholtzer was thirteenth in 29:08; and Joshua Lauer was fourteenth in 29:10. Overall, six of the top eight and nine of the top fourteen were Wolverines. After the race, Garrett Cichowitz stated that: “The greatest motivation in a race is beyond what one can have when looking inward, but rather comes from focusing on one’s surroundings: fans, teammates, and most importantly God. I would not have survived the race without the latter.”