Johns Hopkins Women Cross Country – National Champions

Screen shot: NCAA live feed

The top-ranked Johns Hopkins University women’s cross country team demonstrated themselves to be truly worthy of that year-long placement by defending their national championship from 2012. They posted 85 points to top Williams with 137, Middlebury with 185, and the University of Chicago with 216.

The top runner for Hopkins was Westminster, Maryland native Hannah Oneda who placed fourth in 21:27 over the 6-kilometer course in cold and breezy Hanover, Indiana. There were six competitors within the space of five seconds just behind her. The winner was Chelsea Johnson of St. Scholastica in 21:11.

Rounding out the scoring for Hopkins:

14^th – Annie Monagle – 21:43 (All-American)

15^th – Frances Loeb – 21:44 (All-American)

38^th – Holly Clarke – 22:03

46^th – Ashley Murphy – 22:09

(Also for Hopkins, Abby Flock and Tess Meehan finished 136 and 137 at 22:49 and 22:50.)

Particularly critical for this victory was the performance of JHU’s fifth runner – Ashley Murphy – who has been out of racing because of injury since the beginning of October.  Without the junior’s critical points, the team would have fallen to second place.

The Hopkins men’s team did not fare quite as well, though 11^th in the country is still a fine accomplishment. Having defeated the perennial conference and regional powers of Haverford College and Dickinson College in both the conference and regional meets, the JHU men saw their nemeses finish slightly ahead of them today – Dickinson 8^th and Haverford 10^th.  Winning the national team championship was St. Olaf by a mere two points over North Central, 84-86.

Max Robinson was again the top JHU runner, finishing in 30^th place in 25:19. This is good for all-American status.