THE DAILY ORANGE

‘ZERO TO HERO’

An oral history of Syracuse cross country’s 2015 national title

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T

he Syracuse runners crouched under a foldable tent as the rain picked up in Louisville. Their star, Justyn Knight, was in the middle of post-race interviews, but the final results were still cloudy. The scoreboard had flip-flopped between Syracuse and Colorado, the two-time defending champions, multiple times. But the final time, it stuck on Syracuse’s name.



For the first time in 64 years, the Syracuse men’s cross country team were NCAA champions. Five years later, this is the story of how five Syracuse cross country runners won the national championship.  

Terre Haute, Indiana
Nov. 22, 2014

After placing 10th the year prior, Syracuse finished fifth in the men’s national championship meet, missing the podium by one spot. It was Knight’s freshman year, but the defeat set up a notable offseason for the Orange. 

Justyn Knight, Syracuse runner: I will never forget, I finished 143rd. I remember the exact number. I was in 60th halfway to go, (I) start cramping up, and everyone started to pass me like I was moving in slow motion … I personally felt like I let the team down.

Mark Pryor, former Syracuse runner: At about five miles, Justyn just didn’t have anything left. And he looked at (the alumni), and the look on his face was such despair, and he was like, “Man, I’m sorry.”

Joel Hubbard, Syracuse runner: We had our one off day that year at nationals in 2014, we were fifth. If you had asked us back in August, “How would you guys feel if you got fifth?” we wouldn’t have believed you. And here we were in November 2014 leaving Terre Haute disappointed, without a trophy.

Martin Hehir, Syracuse runner and top-finisher: The first top-10 finish was a motivator for the years to come. Cross country was the priority for us. We missed the podium by one place in 2014, which was the set-up for an awesome offseason.

Philo Germano, Syracuse runner: Colin (Bennie) and I stayed in Syracuse all summer and trained everyday. We put in a lot of miles, and remaining on campus allowed for our minds to stay focused and in the zone of getting ready for race day. We had to speak and work it into existence.

Chris Fox, head coach: From the day that race ended, we started working hard to win in 2015. And that’s what we thought about, and we had an outstanding track season that spring. A good track season is usually a good omen that you’re gonna have a really good fall cross country season.

When we came back in (August), I will never forget our first workout, we went faster than we did in the year prior, not even in our best shape. We were so much stronger.
Justyn Knight, former Syracuse runner

Syracuse, New York
Aug. 31, 2015

After a strong offseason, a group of former SU cross country runners show up at practice with a gift. The title-winning season was just beginning. 

Jamie Navarro, former Syracuse runner: As we were heading into the season, we wanted to do something for the team to let them know we were supporting them throughout the season. Since nationals were to be in Louisville, we had the idea of getting a Lousivlle Slugger baseball bat engraved with a Syracuse logo. We had local alumni come to present the bat to the team. 

Knight: (The alumni) believed in us so much to take time out of their day to come to Syracuse and present us with the Slugger (and) have a talk with us about how much they believed in us. From that point on, it was about doing it not just for ourselves, but the alumni that wore that Orange jersey in the past. 

Fox: From Aug. 15 — the day we started practice — until the race in late November, not one person in the top seven missed one day of practice for illness or injury. That is kind of a key to it all. We stayed healthy, and we trained well. 

Knight: When we came back in (August), I will never forget our first workout. We went faster than we did in the year prior, not even in our best shape. We were so much stronger. 

Chris Lotsbom, assistant editor for Race Results Weekly: Coach Fox had said from the beginning of the season in 2015 that Colorado was the number one all year and the seasoned favorite. From my outside standpoint, Syracuse had the ‘it’ factor in September. They gelled very well.

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Pictured in 2017, Justyn Knight, Collin Bennie and Philo Germano train in Syracuse. Daily Orange File Photo

Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts
Sept. 25, 2015

Syracuse headed into the Coast-to-Coast Battle In Beantown two weeks after a second-place showing at an invitational at Penn State. The Orange were searching for their first victory in a 2015 meet. After this meet at Boston College, they didn’t lose for the rest of the season. 

Knight: We won Boston pretty handily. We won Wisconsin. We won ACCs. We were so used to being underdogs, but the momentum of gathering all these wins really boosted our confidence. 

Lotsbom: They had the depth needed for the national championship. They really built momentum from September up until the national championship. 

Colin Bennie, Syracuse runner: There was one Sweet Road workout … it was either the week before the ACCs or the week before regionals that fall. It’s just sort of this sort of historic day in all of our minds … I just remember everybody running way faster than anyone had ever run up at that point of Sweet Road before. I think we all just kind of looked at each other and were like, “Oh wow, we’re ready to roll. If we can do that, then we can do just about anything at this point.”

Hubbard: While there was pressure on us, and we were under the spotlight, we never even thought about that. We were having fun. We lived with each other. We ran with each other.

Pryor: Syracuse won the ACC Championships, and then we won the regionals. So, it was like a buildup. It was like an anticipation. Everybody kept saying, “Oh man, you’re right, this team is rocking. These guys are winning.” I said, “I told you. I’ve been watching this team for the last five years. They’re going to do it.” 

Louisville, Kentucky
Nov. 21, 2015

Fox’s squad knew since the start of the season that the goal was to reach the podium in Louisville, and the runners were fresh off a first-place finish at the NCAA Northeast Regional Championship eight days prior. Former SU runners traveled to E.P. “Tom” Sawyer State Park and set-up a tailgate-like atmosphere at the finish line. 

Navarro: On race day, we were there before sunrise, setting up shop as the runners from all teams started to warm up. 

Lotsbom: From the get-go, Syracuse’s presence was felt. Talking to them a day before the race, they knew the task at hand, and they were all business in order to run their best race, knowing that Colorado was going to be a top threat to their title hopes. 

Fox: I don’t really try to do anything on race day except keep everyone calm and just kind of smiling and happy … Our sport is not one where you just give a great speech and turn the game around. It’s one of a long buildup of training and confidence. 

Knight: Pre-race, I was really nervous … finishing 143rd (the year before) and seeing a bunch of people cross you, that was traumatizing for me … Coach Fox instilled some confidence in me, and I calmed down. 

Germano: The biggest piece of advice I was told before the race was from a former runner, Joe Allen: “Be patient and do not freak out if you feel like you are drowning in the beginning of the race.” 

Hehir: The day off, the alumni were there in full force, generations of Syracuse runners. It was the first time I saw someone tailgate a cross country meet. 

Jennifer Knight, Justyn’s mother: It was my first tailgate experience ever. We stayed all the way to the end. It was fantastic to see how all the camaraderie and the history of the ‘Cuse alumni work together to support the team in the biggest race of the year.

Knight: They were so loud, I could hear them during the race … Just seeing our alumni and fans go crazy made us want to win that championship.

Hubbard: We all had to have a great day, but somebody had to step up on the unexpected day, and that ended up working out — it ended up being Philo Germano.

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Philo Germano finished 39th in NCAA’s, jumping from 89th place in the Wisconsin Adidas Invitational. Courtesy of SU Athletics

Once the race began, SU’s top runners took the lead, with Knight finishing fourth and Bennie and Hehir finishing seconds apart at eighth and ninth, respectively. But it was Germano, the unheralded walk-on, whose race stood out the most. In the last 1K, he passed 13 runners on his way to finishing 39th. 

Hubbard: (Germano) was 80th or something at the Wisconsin meet that fall, and then he ended up being 39th at nationals. People don’t make that jump usually. If anything, people usually go backwards … For Philo to jump, it was such a remarkable thing, and it was the difference maker.

Germano: I thought I was at least in the 100s and began to freak out. I eventually came to a comfortable mindset in the last 2K and started to pick up speed. It was a jolt for me to cross the finish line while passing as many people as I can.

Sara Germano, Philo’s mother: When my daughter and I were running to go to the back to find all the runners, I remember running in this big field, and this guy comes up, and he grabs me and hugs me, and it was Coach (Adam) Smith, and he says, “He did it, he did it.” 

Germano: I am pretty sure Coach Fox came up to me at the hotel and asked, “What the f*ck was that?” I think that summed up how we all felt about the race. 

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Shannon Kirkpatrick | Design Editor

With Syracuse’s top five runners under the tent by the finish line, the scoreboard eventually landed on Syracuse’s name. The Colorado team, standing right next to Syracuse, congratulated the cross country champions on the spot. Long-awaited celebrations ensued.

Fox: When they started posting the scores on the scoreboard, it kept changing … For a little bit we won, for a little bit Colorado won, and finally they posted the official score, and we won. Yeah, it was amazing. 

Pryor: The NCAA took so much time in announcing the winner, and so we’re standing there, and for a long time — for at least an hour — the big scoreboard kept saying that Colorado won. So we’re like, not bad, we came in second … All of a sudden, I start hearing people screaming. And so, I looked at one of my former teammates, and I said, “Wouldn’t it be something if we won.” … Somebody says, “We won.” And I said, “No way.” 

Chris Getman, former Syracuse runner: I love the fact that they caught some people off guard. It was an upset, but in hindsight, it came from less than a decade, from ground zero to a national championship. It is just unbelievable.

Tom Ryan, former Syracuse runner: It was like being at a basketball game in the Dome when it’s overtime against Georgetown It was that kind of excitement, when everybody’s on their feet, and they win the game at the last second — in overtime. That was the kind of thrill that all of us had when they announced they had won.

We planned on something, we built for it for 10 years and we got there.
Chris Fox, former Syracuse men’s cross country head coach

The team celebrated on the podium with numerous alumni and spoke with Ryan Urie, a member of the 2014 team who was battling leukemia, on FaceTime. That morning, the players took photos with the national championship trophy and the engraved Louisville Slugger bat and waved 6-foot Syracuse flags in celebration. 

Bennie: Whoever thought to get (Ryan) up on the phone for FaceTime and have him be held in front of the trophy, that was very special. And I know my parents have a picture of us up on the podium like that, and you can see Ryan Urie on the FaceTime, and he’s got a smile from ear to ear … I know getting to share that experience with him probably meant even more than the experience itself just because he shaped … pretty much everyone on that team just as much as we all shaped each other.

Knight: Seeing Coach Fox, Smith and (Brien) Bell being so happy because they have been there longer than us, building the program up against critics that said they would never win an NCAA championship, just to see their faces was heartwarming.

Fox: We planned on something. We built for it for 10 years, and we got there.

Pryor: To Coach Fox’s credit, he had every one of the alumni take a picture with the NCAA plaque. So everyone got to hold the NCAA plaque, which none of us had ever done … Everybody now shared in the memory of Syracuse winning a national title in cross country.

Hehir: We carried that trophy all over the city that night. We never fell asleep. Even for a 7 a.m. flight, we were running off the high of winning. We were just obnoxious, carrying the trophy, still cheering. We tucked the trophy in, gave it his own seat. 

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Syracuse men’s cross country celebrates on the podium with the NCAA trophy and the engraved Louisville Slugger bat which was gifted to the team by former runners at the start of the season. Courtesy of SU Athletics

The Orange solidified themselves as a powerhouse after 2015’s title, which helped with recruiting. Five seniors — including Hehir — departed that year, and Fox did the same in the summer of 2018. The program experienced a steady rebuild under head coach Bell, but the expectation for future success remained.

Knight: We already accomplished (the championship), so that feeling of desperately wanting to do it was not all there (in 2016). We definitely still had a hunger to win it, but we already had a taste of victory. That being said, we added a lot of great new runners and had a great season, while ending up placing third in 2016. We gave it our best. We did not all perform as best as we wanted to. We had the talent to repeat, but we were not the best team that day. 

Fox: We defended well, the guys ran great, and we came up a little short. 2015 was the perfect season, 2016 was about 10% off.

Knight: The team is in good hands. We are at a point of rebuilding. The class of Marty Hehir really set down the sacrifice and discipline to win. The guys there now are really in the same boat in trying to build that culture. Having a coaching transition was a huge hit to the team, but having someone in-house really helped. I think it is building up something special for the next few years.

Hehir: What Coach Fox and Bell did, starting as the worst team in the Big East to winning a national championship, the bar has been set for the caliber of the team and the runner.

Ryan: When I ran at Syracuse in the 80s, it was unimaginable that they had a national caliber team in cross country. (I’m) very, very proud. 

Ken Miller, former Syracuse runner: I never thought Syracuse would win a national championship in (either) track and field or cross country. It never crossed my mind, even when I was at Syracuse. So, it’s like a dream come true. 

Jonathan Gault, reporter for LetsRun.com: Their legacy is they showed the sport it was possible to go from zero to hero, to build a national title contender from the ground up.

Pryor: For my school to do it, and for me to be there, and for me to have all my former teammates there, you couldn’t write it (any) better.

Banner photo design by Emily Steinberger | Photo Editor; Photos courtesy of Jamie Navarro

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