Both Syracuse teams finish top 2 at regionals, earn trip to nationals

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The Syracuse men’s and women’s teams are headed to the NCAA Cross Country Championships for the 13th straight time after two top-two finishes at the NCAA Northeast Regional on Friday.

The Syracuse men won the Northeast Regional 8K race at the University of Massachusetts with a score of 51 points, beating out second-place Harvard by 17 points. The men had four top-15 finishers starting at No. 3 with redshirt senior Aidan Tooker at 30:15, who was followed closely by graduate Joe Dragon (30:22) at No. 6, graduate JP Trojan (30:24) at No. 8 and sophomore Matthew Scrape (30:47) at No. 13.

Freshman Alex Comerford (30:59) came in fifth for SU and 21st overall. Senior Brody Smith (31:40) and sophomore Noah Beveridge (32:26) placed for scoring as well, coming in at 43rd and 82nd, respectively.

On the women’s side, senior Amanda Vestri became the 2022 Northeast Regional Champion. The Orange finished second in their 6K race with 81 points, led by Vestri’s winning time of 20:05. The next SU scorer came exactly a minute later when senior Annie Boos (21:05) crossed in 12th place.

Three SU scorers all crossed within 13 seconds of Boos, starting with junior Abigail Spiers (21:08) at No. 17, junior Holly Bent (21:17) at No. 25 and sophomore Savannah Roark (21:18) at No. 26. Sydney Nowicki (21:45) and Sophia Jacob-Townsel (22:00) finished 45th and 63rd, respectively, to round out the Syracuse scoring.

The Orange women trailed first-place Harvard by 10 points but beat out third-place Providence by 27.

Syracuse will compete for the NCAA Championship next Saturday in Tallahassee, Florida.