SU got back on track in the Big East championship, taking the title with four harriers finishing in the top 10.

“Last week we showed that we have the pieces to be a good team,” Smith said. “We just need to put everything together on the right day and we can be one of those top teams.”

Though the 210-runner field set for the NCAA Northeast Regional will be less challenging to maneuver than the 316-harrier Adidas Invitational. SU found its stride on the open field at the Big East championship, but the team will need to avoid getting boxed in like it did against Wisconsin at this weekend’s meet in Madison, Conn.

Coming off the Big East title, the men’s team has momentum on its side. The women’s team saw spurts of growth and decline as it finished sixth overall, two spots down from its 2011 Big East finish.

SU senior Sarah Pagano, who led the pack with a ninth-place finish in the Big East, realizes she must step up more as a leader for the young women’s team to have a strong showing in the Northeast Regional.

“The region is pretty stacked this year,” Pagano said. “So our goal is to qualify for nationals, but we’re going to have to have our best race to do so.”

Assistant coach Adam Smith says sticking to the fundamentals will help the team advance in the competitive field.

Running two 10Ks in two weeks fatigues the body, so head coach Chris Fox’s focus was recovering and healing their bodies. In a typical week of practice the team averages 70 miles, but in an effort to restore his runners’ bodies, Fox toned the workouts down, having just three intense practices over the past two weeks.

Redshirt sophomore Max Straneva is still “a little hurt” and will not compete, but Smith is confident SU can be a top team even without him. Andrew Palmer, a redshirt sophomore, will fill his spot.

“Andrew is a great runner so it’s not like we’re downgrading at all,” Fox said.

Straneva’s injury is minor to the team as on Tuesday night, SU redshirt junior Joe Whelan didn’t know the definitive top-seven harriers, as any nine runners could be set to run.

The men’s team is deep, but Fox says the women’s team has its work cut out for it to finish with the lowest score possible.

Pagano knows running with a young team has its challenges. To help the team advance, Pagano is looking to freshman Brianna Nerud.

“She has been having great workouts and finding her way each race,” Pagano said. “Brianna’s a very talented freshman and I think she’ll come up big for us.”

Despite the injuries and running in a larger field, the team’s depth gives it confidence as it goes for its fourth consecutive Regional title.

Hehir won the Big East individual championship and led the team to it’s third Big East title in four years. Missing the nod as Big East champions last year, Hehir was determined to bring the program its last Big East title before departing for the Atlantic Coast Conference next season.

“It means a lot to the team and the school especially since it’s our last Big East,” Hehir said. “We really wanted to go out with the title and have it be undisputed”

In a tight race at the end, Hehir outlasted Providence’s Shane Quinn, who led for majority of the race.

“Other guys started coming from behind us so we started sprinting,” Hehir said. “It just ended up I just started catching Shane Quinn.”

Hehir said the coaches were on the sidelines screaming and urging them to finish strong.

Flying past Quinn, Hehir sprinted to a time of 24:37.20 to edge Quinn by 1.6 seconds.

The Orange rebounded for the championship after a disappointing finish in the Wisconsin Invitational. SU came in 11th place at the meet, which featured elite competition.

“The Wisconsin race was really our first big race of the season,” Hehir said. “So it was kind of the first race we weren’t going to win.”

Wisconsin was not the team’s best race but the Big East Championship was a race of redemption.

“It was really important for us to win the last Big East meet that we’ll be in,” head coach Chris Fox said. “We don’t like to lose.”

Syracuse started the race pack running, and the runners stayed together until the midway point.

Running 12-13 miles a day and a total of 70 miles at the end of the week, the course and volume was familiar to the Syracuse runners.

Seventy miles are now easy for Hehir to complete, but he struggled with the training when he first arrived at Syracuse.

“He came in a little bit inexperienced,” Fox said. “To tell you the truth in his first six weeks he wasn’t very good.”

But Fox said his hard work paid off, and it showed with his performance in the Big East championship. And his head coach thinks he has the potential to earn All-American honors, too.

“If I was in his shoes that would be my goal,” Fox said. “It’s a big goal for a freshman, but if he runs like he did on Friday, he has an opportunity for sure.”

Named the Big East champion in the conference tournament, Hehir led Syracuse to its third conference title in four years. Syracuse missed the nod as Big East champions last year, so Hehir was determined to bring a title back to the program before departing for the Atlantic Coast Conference next season.

“It means a lot to the team and the school, especially since it’s our last Big East,” Hehir said. “We really wanted to go out with the title and have it be undisputed”

In a tight race at the end, Hehir outlasted Providence’s Shane Quinn, who led for the majority of the race.

“Other guys started coming from behind us, so we started sprinting,” Hehir said. “It just ended up I just started catching Shane Quinn.”

Hehir recalls the coaches on the sidelines screaming and cheering them on to finish strong.

Flying past Quinn, Hehir sprinted to a time of 24:37.20 — Quinn’s time, 24:38.31, a 1.1-second differential. Mehir passed Quinn to take first place and Whelan came in fourth place.

The Orange once again proved how strong its team was after a disappointing finish in the Wisconsin Invitational.

The men’s team placed first in every invitational earlier in the season, but struggled in Wisconsin. The Adidas Invitational was the first big race of the season in which Syracuse competed with 20 of the top 30 programs in the country.

“The Wisconsin race was really our first big race of the season,” Hehir said. “So it was kind of the first race we weren’t going to win.”

Hehir came in 72nd place as harriers for the Orange placed from 56th to 181st  place. As a team, the Orange came in 11th place.

Wisconsin was not the team’s best race, but the Big East Championship was a race of redemption.

“It was really important for us to win the last Big East meet that we’ll be in,” head coach Chris Fox said. “We don’t like to lose.”

At the Big East Championship, the last harrier to place for Syracuse was in 41st place. Syracuse’s entire team was deep. The remaining 70-plus harriers from the 13 other Big East schools finished the race staggered because they only had a few solid runners.

Syracuse started the race pack running, and they stayed together until midway through. The familiar course helped them run together; Hehir said the hilly course was to their advantage.

“It was a grass field and a dirt path; it was a hilly course,” Hehir said. “It suited us because we do a lot of hilly courses when we train.”

Running 12 to 13 miles a day and a total of 70 miles at the end of the week, the course and volume was familiar to the Syracuse runners.

Seventy miles are now easy for Hehir to complete. He struggled with the training when he first arrived at Syracuse, but eventually acclimated to the new intensity of training.

“He came in a little bit inexperienced,” Fox said. “To tell you the truth, in his first six weeks, he wasn’t very good.”

But Fox said his hard training paid off, as he definitely is in the top 7 as a freshman.

As far as being an All-American for the NCAA Championship, Fox said: “If I was in his shoes, that would be my goal. It’s a big goal for a freshman, but if he runs like he did on Friday, he has an opportunity for sure.”

Whenever Brian had a race, Joe would ask to join.

“There was a race I asked if I could run in and he said I was too young, but when the gun went off I went anyways,” Joe Whelan said.

When he was 10, Whelan unknowingly completed his first 5K in 23 minutes. Brian was proud of his young son’s tenacity, realizing he raised a runner.

As a runner himself, Brian was hesitant to let his small son start cross country, knowing the stresses and injuries it could have on the body. Joe’s will to run overshadowed his father’s worries.

In the eighth grade, Whelan recorded times faster than high school runners in his hometown of Hamburg, N.Y. Hamburg’s high school head coach Ron Fortuna approached Joe and Brian, and asked Joe to try out for the varsity team.

Brian was hesitant to let his son run with older boys, but it was something Joe was willing to try.

“I talked to the coach and told him ‘I don’t want you running him a lot,’” Brian said. “He was running with juniors and seniors, like were they going to get mad at him?”

Recording the best times on the team, the upperclassmen gravitated to Whelan.

“They used to take him out for pizza,” Brian said. “Here is this little eighth grader, and all the older guys were taking him out all the time.”

Whelan applied the leadership role his high school teammates bestowed on him and translated it to being a team leader this season at Syracuse. As the team prepares to run in the Big East championship Oct. 26, Whelan’s goal is to bring another Big East title to the program.

One teammate he thinks can help the Orange accomplish this goal is freshman Daniel Lennon.

“He seems the strongest in the workouts,” Whelan said. “He’s not redshirting and we all understand he has a certain talent and he can help us out this year.”

For this reason, Whelan took Lennon under his wing. Resuming the leadership role did not always come naturally for Whelan as he needed a leader to be there for him too. After suffering an injury his sophomore year, Whelan almost walked away from cross country.

While ice skating with a group of friends, Whelan fell and fractured his knee. He then practiced on the fractured knee; the pressure caused it to break.

“It was a crazy accident,” Whelan said. “It’s just like your iPhone, you can drop it 100 times and it may not crack, but if you drop it that one time and it hits the right angle it may crack.”

The accident caused Whelan to reach his breaking point. Due to the extent of his recovery, Whelan struggled with not competing.

Through the encouragement of head coach Chris Fox, Whelan stuck with cross country. Whelan says Fox believed in him sometimes more than he believed in himself.

“I appreciate Joe’s words, but he was an easy one,” Fox said. “Joe was a good guy about rehabbing and doing the right things when he’s hurt”

Redshirt senior Griff Graves also played a role in sticking with cross country. He found hope in Graves, who did not run cross country for two years, but remained positive about getting better.

Though he’s a leader, Whelan still looks up to teammates.

“I look up to Griff,” Whelan said. “He’s been through injuries that needed surgery and he was able to bounce back. He is the epitome of a teammate.”

Coming off of a short week after competing in the season’s most high-caliber race at the Wisconsin Adidas Invitational on Oct. 12, the top-seven men and women runners did not compete in Friday’s race.

The Orange had no problem showing up without its top runners.

Reminiscent of the first three invitationals of the season, the men’s team placed four runners in the top 10.

Freshman Andres Bennison finished first for the Orange and second overall with a time of 26:19 in the 5-mile race. Freshman Juris Silenieks came in fourth place with a time of 26:28. Senior Jonathan Aziz and freshman Joe Kush rounded out the top 10 finishing in seventh and 10th, respectively.

The women’s team matched its season debut at the Harry Lang Invitational with five harriers in the top 10.

In the 5,000-meter race against Cornell, Niagara and Cortland State, Syracuse junior Kimberly Spano finished first with a time of 18:40 with junior Breanna Symoniak finishing fractions of a second behind her. Freshmen showed their skills as Emily Nist, Margo Malone and Katherine Kinkead rounded out the top 10.

Syracuse stuck with its emphasized pack mentality in this race. The Orange looks to keep up the pace for the Big East championship on Oct. 26 in the Bronx.

—Compiled by Melissa Bronson-Tramel, staff writer, qsbronso@syr.edu

That streak will be challenged on Friday when the No. 10 Orange travels to Madison,Wis., to compete in the Wisconsin Adidas Invitational.

SU is set to compete with 20 of the top 30 teams in the country. Placing first will be a little more difficult in this invitational.

“It won’t be like this anymore,” SU head coach Chris Fox said. “It will be spread out from fifth place to 100th place.”

Fox said this will be an individual race. In the past invitationals, Syracuse pack-raced, which is a team-oriented style of running, leading to a sea of Orange harriers consecutively crossing the finish line together.

Pack running is a strategy the men’s team has used for the past couple of years. Based on seniority and the depth of the team — there is only one true freshman — creating a pack mentality was easy. The team members work out in big groups to give everyone the experience of running in a pack and the feel of running as a unit.

“They definitely gear all of our training for that workout,” redshirt freshman Andrew Bennison said. “To make sure we stick together in workouts and are sticking together if someone is having a bad day.”

Bennison found himself falling behind in the Toledo Bubble Buster Invitational, not placing in the Top 10 with the other Syracuse harriers.

“Normally I’m with the pack,” Bennison said. “That was just a bad race for me.”

Placing fourth in the Harry Lang Invitational and eighth at the Dartmouth Invitational, Bennison knows what it’s like to finish with his teammates.

“You just get that huge confidence boost when you’re running with eight, nine or 10 guys around you,” Bennison said.

Fox has run all his eligible runners, but his top seven are not quite defined. Each race, a different harrier leads the pack. At Colgate it was redshirt senior Griff Graves. At Dartmouth it was junior Joe Whelan. And most recently at Toledo it was redshirt Martin Hehir.

Fox credits the team for following the plan well this season. In each race, the SU runners have gone to the front of the pack and kept a consistent pace in the first half, and came out tougher the second.

“We wanted to go out front and dominate the races because we thought we were the best team in these couple races,” Fox said.

But SU will be tested as the level of competition will intensify at this point in the season. Though pack running is comforting for the team and described as easier because it helps runners maintain contact with teammates, it may be difficult to execute against elite competition.

Pack running is also an attitude and intimidation factor the Orange hopes to bring to Wisconsin, but they may have a few other tricks in store.

“There’s a little more strategy in the one at Wisconsin and a little less strategy in those,” Fox said. “They’ve run well, but Friday we’ll see how good they are.”

During her senior year at North Shore High School (N.Y.), Nerud, the 2012 top cross country recruit, visited Georgetown, Providence, Duke and Syracuse.

“We really thought she was going to Duke,” Deborah Nerud, Nerud’s mother, said. “She had her foot in the door there.”

But in December 2011, Nerud committed to Syracuse to give the Orange a runner with a decorated high school career. Last summer, Nerud broke the American juniors record in the 3000-meter steeplechase at the IAAF World Junior Championships. After showing steady improvement throughout high school, the freshman is on her way to becoming a top runner for Syracuse.

When Nerud started competing in cross country in seventh grade, she was not positive she even wanted to pursue cross country in high school. At that time, Nerud’s heart was set on the musical arts.

She took voice lessons in the eighth grade and performed in winter musicals.

“In the winter, she didn’t run; she would do musicals,” Deborah said. “Her big dream was to be on Broadway.”

But that dream was short-lived when she decided to give cross country one more try. Nerud practiced with the team the summer before her freshman year at North Shore, finding another passion to pursue.

“I realized that I loved to run and loved the aspect of competing and the team concept,” Nerud said.

Nerud credits her high school coach, Neal Levy, for her commitment to running, saying he pushed her to excel each year.

“Brianna improved every single season of every single year of her high school career, which is very rare,” Levy said.

Nerud almost suffered a setback in the 10th grade when her family found out she was iron deficient.

“We didn’t realize she was doing so much mileage and she wasn’t eating enough red meat,” Deborah said.

Her family resolved the deficiency quickly so she could continue to compete.

In her last year of high school, Nerud received numerous national honors as she shattered records nationally and locally.

At the IAAF World Juniors Championship in Barcelona, Spain, Nerud finished the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 10:00.72, passing Providence runner Shelby Greany’s record of 10:00.88 for the American Junior under-20 set in 2010.

While not many people expected Nerud to break out like she did at the end of the season, Levy saw it coming.

“Brianna’s best races are ones where she builds confidence in herself, where it wasn’t so much about winning or a time, but trying to reach her potential in whatever she does,” Levy said.

Now, Nerud is looking to achieve her potential at SU.

As she prepared for her first meet, the athletic department and Nerud’s mother had her iron levels tested again. They found her levels were high, meaning she could continue to compete.

It allowed Nerud to run her first college race for the Orange on Sept. 21, at the Toledo Inter-Regional Bubble Buster. Nerud was one of four true freshmen to run.

Nerud was the first freshman to finish, placing 19th overall in the 4K with a time of 13:43.1. She said her first race went well because she stuck with the plan formed with SU head coach Chris Fox.

Nerud ran a harder, faster race in the second half. Teaming up with sophomore Jessie Petersen, the pair went in the middle of the pack and worked together to move ahead of the other runners.

Nerud said following the plan helped keep her poised to finish strong.

“I felt like I ran a hard and smart race,” Nerud said. “I just hope next time I can help my team have less points.”

Her SU career is only starting, but her record-breaking performances in high school garnered Nerud national attention.

As soon as the Syracuse cross-country staff could, they started reaching out to her, said John Oliver, SU’s cross country director of operations.

“She’s always been a top-level athlete in high school, so we had her on our radar,” Oliver said. “At the start of her senior year we started getting in touch with her, talking to her coach and getting to know her family.”

Nerud said she liked what the Syracuse coaches had to say, eventually swaying her decision from Duke to SU.

“I loved the coaches and I thought they would really help me keep improving to a higher level,” Nerud said.

“I remember him saying, ‘I ran about a mile before, but I’m not sure how long this 5K is,’” Sandy Graves, his mother, said. “I knew the distance, but all he had to know was to run.”

He was 6 years old then.

Graves, now 22, is still running as a member of the Syracuse men’s cross country team. The redshirt senior and the Orange will run at the Toledo Inter-Regional Bubble Buster at 5 p.m. Friday in Ohio.

But his running career was almost cut short in 2009 when he suffered an injury that would sideline him from cross country for two years. Graves got out of bed and felt a pop in his left hip halfway through the track and field season.

“After it popped it hurt a little, I worked out that afternoon, it still hurt, but I was able to get through the workouts,”Graves said.

Ignoring the pain,Graves finished the rest of the season.

While training in summer 2010 for cross country, Graves noticed his hip getting worse.

“My hip started to get tighter and tighter as the season went on, and I couldn’t get my knees up for a press off,”Graves said.

Noticing the obvious difference in his performance, head coach Chris Fox decided to redshirt Graves for the 2010 cross country season until someone could figure out what was wrong with his hip.

In April 2011, Graves took an MRI and the doctors found he had a snapped labrum that would require surgery.

Graves’ father, Tom Graves, was on a trip with his wife to Atlanta,Ga., when his son called and told them the news.

“As much as I’d hate to say, it was kind of a like-father-like-son thing,” Tom Graves said.

Graves’ father was a cross country runner at Auburn University. He injured his heel sophomore year and it took two years before he could compete again.

Graves’ didn’t know it yet, but he would be out for a second year too.

In surgery, doctors found he had a bone spur and a torn ligament in addition to his torn labrum.

The pop Graves heard that morning was the sound of his ligament snapping. His injury got worse as he added more stress to it.

Graves never expected the news. But he didn’t let the additional recovery time deter him from running again.

“There were definitely times where he might have been frustrated, but he never gave up,”Graves’ younger brother, Dusty, said. “He kept up with all the things he needed to do to recover.”

Graves woke up early each morning to go to the pool and swim. He used a stationary bike to strengthen his hip muscles and completed his day’s rehabilitation in the Carmelo K. Anthony Center.

On an average day, Graves said he put in about four hours of rehabbing.

John Oliver, director of operations for the cross country team, assures the program never considered dropping Graves. Oliver believes Graves’ assets, even while he was injured, were worth more than losing him.

“When you have a guy like that, you find it’s better to stick with him because he brings a lot more to the table than what you see,” Oliver said.

At the start of the 2012 season, all eyes were on Graves’ return. He did not disappoint.

In the first invitational of the season,Graves finished second overall and was the top finisher for SU.

While Graves is modest about his victory, he is confident he has more left in him.

Said Graves: “Syracuse has been so supportive with keeping me here, so now I hope I can do what they’ve kept me here to do.”

That was two years ago. Now?

“I’m hopefully in the top five,” said Clinton, now in her junior season.

And she has proven that thus far. Clinton, out of Ramsey High School in New Jersey, finished second out of the SU women and 11th overall at the Dartmouth Invitational this past Saturday. Her run helped the No. 9 Orange women’s cross country team take third overall in the invite.

Clinton said making the adjustment to a Division-I program was the biggest challenge of her career so far. She remembers that, so she and the rest of the team’s veteran athletes are making a commitment to help the younger athletes on the team.

The team is young, as 32 of the 45 athletes are freshman and sophomores. But the expectations couldn’t be higher.

“A lot of us upperclassmen are trying to step up and be there for all the young ones, and that’s something they’re (the coaches) very happy about because it’s not something that happens every year,” Clinton said.

And while Clinton is one of the top runners on the women’s side, she’s not focused solely on individual achievements.

“I’m always there to help people if they are struggling,” she said.

This commitment to camaraderie has led the team to success so far this season. The men have collected two wins, and the women have one win and a third place finish. And greater success is expected as the season progresses.

“Being close and helping each other out — that’s a strength of ours. That’s something that will take us far,” Clinton said.

But no matter how far the team goes, Clinton always wants more from her performance.

“I don’t think I’ve ever walked away from a practice or a race being really happy,” Clinton said.  “I walk away from everything and wonder, ‘What could I have done better?’”

This competitive attitude is likely what has gotten her to where she is now.

For Clinton, she hopes the younger athletes will adopt her commitment to helping teammates while striving to improve as individual runners.

Though Clinton’s imprint on the team is clear, she is not satisfied yet.

Said Clinton: “I guess I’ve had somewhat of an impact, but I always want to do more.”

This season, the Syracuse head coach said he will hold out his top seven runners in hopes of shaking the rust off Forrest Misenti and Griff Graves, who both missed time during their Syracuse careers.

Fox said he plans on introducing those two injured runners in “low-key” races to get them ready for the bigger ones that will come later this season.

“It’s almost like a scrimmage for football,” Fox said.

Graves hasn’t competed since 2009, and Misenti has not raced since February 2011. They both had seasons cut short by injuries, and they both returned in the first race of the season at Colgate.

Graves was the top SU finisher and placed second overall with a time of 20:06 in the 6,400-meter race, and Misenti placed fifth with a time of 20:17.

Graves was pleased but humble about his performance.

“Anytime you can come back into your first race and compete on the level you want to compete, it’s always good,” he said.

Misenti was more impressed.

“Seeing him finish second place and go after the win the last half mile was really impressive,” Misenti said.

On Sept. 8 at the Dartmouth Invitational, the No. 12 men’s team snagged another first-place finish. The Orange dominated the race with eight runners finishing in the Top 10.

Working Misenti and Graves back into running shape comes at a price, though. As the two mount their respective returns, few true freshmen have participated in the Harry Lang Invitational or Dartmouth Invitational.

Instead, many runners have been left back to practice at Manley Field House. Fox said acclimating his youngest runners to college races before they compete is crucial early in the season.

Brianna Nerud is transitioning from high school to college meets this season. The freshman enjoyed a record-setting career at North Shore High School (N.Y.), but was held out of both meets thus far.

Running at Syracuse is a different — and much higher — level of competition. And Nerud said it requires a higher level of preparation.

“Training with a big team is different,” Nerud said. “The workouts are harder because of higher intensity some days, and longer.”

To ease that acclimation period, Fox has often redshirted first-year runners. He held out nine freshmen from competition in 2011, and he said he plans on repeating that strategy this year.

Fox said that habit squeezes the most eligibility out of his runners, too.

“If you run them, you can’t redshirt them,” Fox said.

It also opens up spots for Fox to integrate his top performers, like Misenti and Graves, back into the lineup.

Senior Sarah Pagano ran at Dartmouth after Fox held her out of the Harry Lang Invitational. She was the top finisher for SU and finished seventh with a time of 21:38.70.

Though the Orange has not run all its top runners, the team has been successful through two meets. Fox can slowly bring runners back from injury now before the bigger meets down the road.

“The real test will be over the next few weeks,” Graves said. “We’ll see how we stack up as the competition gets better.”