STATE COLLEGE - Wisconsin's women would have surprised a lot of people if it hadn't won the Big Ten Cross Country Championship this past Saturday. As it happened, the Badgers surprised nobody, except perhaps by the dominance they showed over the rest of the field.
The fifth-ranked Badgers won the meet with a 35-point showing, claiming the first, second, third, ninth and 10th individual spots.
Michigan, Minnesota and Michigan State placed second, third and fourth respectively, but none were within reach of an undermatched Wisconsin squad. Sophomore Erica Palmer won the race with a personal-best time of 16:46:93. She was followed immediate
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| JESSICA JOHNSON/Daily No. 5 Wisconsin dominated the competition at the Big Ten Championships this weekend. The Badgers had five runners place in the top 10. |
"I feel really well," Palmer said. "I could do better on that last hill, but I'm pleased. The plan was to stay as a team for the first mile and I didn't do that. I just got really nervous and took off."
Palmer established herself early and never looked back. With a first-mile split time of 5:07 that shocked the State College crowd, the top runner impressed her team, her competitors and her parents, who saw her race for the first time since junior high school.
"Erica looks like she'll be a contender nationally," Michigan coach Mike McGuire said. "She looked today like (last year's national champion, former Michigan runner) Katie McGregor did last year. If you run 16:46 on this course, you're really moving."
By the second mile, things started to come into focus. Palmer, Aufderheide, and Brewster were running first, second, and third, respectively.
Minnesota's Rasa Michniovaite was in fourth, 21 seconds behind Palmer, and did not relinquish the spot. Michigan's top runner Lisa Ouellet was running fifth but faded in the final mile, as she allowed Michigan State's Cynthia Durocher and Indiana's Amanda Bell to move ahead of her.
"I could have run better," Ouellet said. "I can knock off Wisconsin's two or three. At least at regionals I want to be right there with them. We ran with a lot of heart and courage today. By beating Michigan State and Minnesota we did ourselves a lot of good."
Michigan entered the weekend unranked, and managed to upset Minnesota and Michigan State, ranked 17th and 18th nationally. A 12th-place finish by junior Katie Clifford and a 14th-place finish by senior Elizabeth Kampfe helped the Wolverines edge out Minnesota by three points.
"We thought that Michigan State was going to be our battle," Minnesota coach Gary Wilson said.
"We looked past Michigan and I said to the kids that you just can't count out Michigan. They've just got too much talent there. They came out and performed today, and that's the sign of a true champion."
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