Cross Country Hosts Aggie Opener to Start Season

Wednesday, September 1

Bryan-College Station

6:45 PM

Texas A&M

Aggie Opener

Cross Country Generic COLLEGE STATION, TX - 20210830 - Cross Country Practice

Photo by: Craig Bisacre

Aug 31, 2021 | Cross Country

By: Tyler Pounds, Athletics Communications

BRYAN-COLLEGE STATION, Texas – The Texas A&M men's and women's cross country teams hosts the Aggie Opener Wednesday night at the Dale Watts Cross Country Course.

"The first meet starts to tell you where you're at a little bit," said distance Coach Wendel McRaven. "We've had a couple weeks of training, so we are starting to see where people are. This is going to be our first real test."

The Aggies return multiple top runners from last year, including the top five Aggie finishers from the Southeastern Conference 2020 men's and women's teams. An experienced group on the men's side, seniors Eric Casarez, Gavin Hoffpauir and Wes McPhail are expected to lead the Maroon & White.

"On the men's side, we believe we have a lot of depth and we bring back a lot of experience," McRaven said. "You look at some of those freshmen last year, we didn't necessary all hit at the same time but we saw moments when those guys started to step-up. We hope that Eric [Casarez] is a guy that can get back to the NCAA Championships and contend to be an All-American this year. He had a rough year last season, he battled injuries and went through COVID-19, and it was just a rough season. He's been training well and I think he is going to be a great leader for us on the course."

Top returners on the women's side include the dynamic senior duo of Julia Black and Abbey Santoro. The Keller, Texas, pair finished as the top two Aggies in four of five meets in 2020, while Grace Plain, Megan Hopper, Carrie Fish and Katelyn Buckley return with SEC experience.

"On the women's side, we have a lot of healthy runners in Abbey [Santoro], Julia [Black], Grace [Plain] and Megan [Hopper] back," McRaven said. "I'm really excited about this freshman group in Maddie Livingston, Gemma Goddard and Emma Ellis, they've all come in really fit and had good summers. Overall, there was a lot of people that had great summers."

Toeing the starters line include regional teams Baylor, TCU, Houston, Abilene Christian, SMU (women) and others. The women's 4.1k race begins the evening at 6:45 p.m., followed by the men's 6k at 7:15 p.m.

"This is the best field this opener has had since we've started it," McRaven said. "The depth and quality of teams is far better than the past. For us, it is still a rust buster and we are going to control somethings where we will have some race plans where people run together and work together."

Admission to the meet is free. Fans can follow @aggietfxc for up-to-date results, as well as flash results for live results. Watts Cross Country Course is located directly behind the Hildebrand Equine Complex on the corner of F and B Road and FM 2818. For GPS units, a good address to use is 3242 F and B Road, College Station.