UW-La Crosse Season Outlook

For Immediate Release: Thursday, August 21, 2008

La Crosse, Wis. – In spite of serious losses to graduation, the 2008 UW-La Crosse men’s cross country should to be a top ranked team again. The Eagles will be led by junior captain Dallas Vincent.

“Our senior class this year will be the smallest we have had in years, but our team success will be dependent on how well they rise to the challenge of competing at their very best as they conclude their careers at UW-L,” says head coach Don Fritsch. The senior class includes Ben Herdeman, Logan O’Grady, Brett Schendel and Seth Webinger.

“We also have an outstanding core of young talent to back them up,” adds Fritsch. Underclassmen who should make an impact include junior Connor Lonning, Paul Moran, Vincent, Kyle Coghlan and Scott Hayden as well as sophomores Chris Glibert, Sean Harrington and Brian Shonat.

Josh Kaul (Stillwater, Minn.), Phill Hernandez (Crystal Lake, Ill.), Damian Hilbert (Chilton, Wis.) and Bryan Zdroik (Stevens Point, Wis.) head up the freshman class coming in this fall.

Lonning, Moran, Vincent, Coghlan and Herdeman all return with national meet experience. “Other encouraging news is the excellent track times that our top runners have posted in the last year or two,” says Fritsch. Lonning ran 15:18 in the 5,000-meters indoors as a freshman and placed third in the 10,000-meters this spring in the outdoor meet in 31:33 as a sophomore. Lonning is also the top returner from the WIAC Cross Country Championships after placing fourth last year.

Herdeman was fifth as a freshman in the outdoor conference meet 5,000-meters in 15:06. “Paul is healthy again and on his way back,” says Fritsch. Moran has posted solid times of 8:39 in the 3,000-meters and 14:49 in the 5,000-meters during the indoor track season. He qualified for outdoor nationals in both the 5,000 and the 10,000 with times of 14:34 and 30:16 as a freshman two years ago. Moran finished in third place in the 10,000-meters at the outdoor nationals.

“Based on these past performances and the potential that they indicate, we should have a good, solid core to build around and should be able to compete with most of the top teams in the conference and nationally,” believes Fritsch.

“Within the conference I expect UW-Stevens Point to be very tough,” says Fritsch. “On paper, they are practically unbeatable as they return their entire team from a year ago. They are battle tested with a very large and veteran senior class.”

“With the return of Willy Kaul, UW-Oshkosh will also be very good and I expect UW-Eau Claire to be a dramatically improved team,” adds Fritsch.

He believes repeating as conference champions for the fifth consecutive year will be a daunting task and an incredible challenge for UW-L. “In the Midwest Region there will be five very good teams, making it extremely tough to qualify for nationals this year,” says Fritsch. “UW-Stevens Point and North Central College, Augustana College, UW-Oshkosh and UW-La Crosse should field very good teams.”

The top two teams from each region get automatic berths and no more than five teams can go to nationals from any one region. “On the national level, the team from SUNY-Cortland is a dominant team on paper and it will take a supreme effort from any other team to deny them the national title,” says Fritsch. He believes other very strong teams on the national scene include Calvin College, North Central College and UW-Stevens Point.

“I’m hoping that we can remain competitive with these teams and contend for another top five national finish,” adds Fritsch. “The last time we ran nationals at Hanover College in 2003 we had a very young team of six sophomores and one junior. That team finished fourth at regionals and a week later was a surprising fourth at nationals. With a little bit of that same good fortune, this 2008 squad may also be able to contend for a top four trophy on the same course this year. As always, it will be a very interesting season to follow and see how things unfold for all of the top teams and individuals.”