Virginia Opens Season Friday with Virginia Invite
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The Virginia men’s and women’s cross country teams will open the season on Friday (Sept. 25) with a home meet against North Carolina and Wake Forest at Panorama Farms in Earlysville, Va.
Due to health and safety considerations in addition to the current guidelines established for sports venues by the Commonwealth of Virginia, attendance at UVA home competitions is limited to family of student-athletes and each team’s coaching staff until further notice. There is no public admission to these events and all tailgating in University parking lots is prohibited.
Media Coverage
Fans can follow the action through live results linked at VirginiaSports.com. Updates throughout the meet will be provided on the team’s official Twitter account, @UVATFCC.
Meet Information
Date: Friday, Sept. 25
Location: Panorama Farms – Earlysville, Va.
• Women’s 5k – 5:15 p.m.
• Men’s 8k – 6 p.m.
The Season Opener
• Virginia will welcome North Carolina and Wake Forest to Panorama Farms on Friday for the team’s season opener
• The meet is the first of three regular-season competitions for the Cavaliers
• The UVA men’s cross country team was picked to finish third in the ACC preseason poll released earlier this month
• The Wake Forest men’s cross country team was selected to finish fifth in the league’s preseason poll, while North Carolina was picked to finish ninth
• On the women’s side, the Tar Heels were picked fifth, while the Demon Deacons and Cavaliers were selected sixth and 10th, respectively
The Cavalier Men
• Virginia returns 14 members from last year’s roster including U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) All-Southeast Region honoree Peter Morris (Hamilton, Va.)
• The Cavaliers also returned Randy Neish (Glastonbury, Conn.), who was a member of UVA’s roster at the NCAA Championships
• UVA made its 17th NCAA team appearance last season, earning an automatic berth to the national meet after winning the NCAA Southeast Regional Championships
• It was the seventh appearance in eight years for the men’s cross country team at NCAAs
• Virginia won the 2019 NCAA Southeast Regional Championships for the third time in program history as all five of the team’s scoring runners earned All-Southeast Region honors
• Virginia welcomes 12 incoming student-athletes to the cross country team in first-years Billy Atkinson (Manhattan Beach, Calif.), Liam Bellamy (Richmond, Va.), Kevin Carlson (Purcellville, Va.), Jack Eliason (Crozet, Va.), Kellen Hasle (Purcellville, Va.), Joe Hawkes (Greenwood, Va.), Nick Karayianis (Potomac, Md.), Conor Murphy (Providence, R.I.), Taylor Ney (Purcellville, Va.), Wes Porter (Kansas City, Mo.), Yasin Sado (Aurora, Colo.) and graduate transfer Ka’eo Kruse (Kalaheo, Hawaii)
The UVA Women
• Virginia is led by seniors Gabriella Karas (Louisville, Ky.) and Hannah Moran (Salem, Va.)
• Karas earned USTFCCCA All-Southeast Region honors with a 25th-place finish at last year’s regional championships
• Moran was the Cavaliers’ top runner during the regular season, leading UVA in all three regular-season competitions
• The women’s team welcomes Emily Alexandru (Trumbull, Conn.), Claire Frazier Bolton (Mobile, Ala.), Ellie Desmond (Ashburn, Va.), Lila Fenner (Portland, Ore.), Liza Neely (Richmond, Va.), Keara Seasholtz (Wayne, Pa.) and Anna Workman (Kingston, Ontario) as first-years to the squad in addition to graduate transfers Georgia Fear (London, England), Michaela Meyer (Southbury, Conn.) and Lauren Moffett (Fresno, Calif.)
A Look at the Tar Heels
• The women’s team is led by fifth-year runner Paige Hofstad, who placed fifth at last year’s ACC Championships
• Hofstad led North Carolina to an eighth-place finish at the conference championships, the team’s best ACC finish since 2015
• She went on to earn an automatic berth to the NCAA Championships after placing ninth at the NCAA Southeast Regional Championships
• The North Carolina men’s cross country team finished 10th at last year’s conference championships, led by returning graduate student Alex Milligan’s 27th-place finish
Wake Forest Runners
• The men’s team placed fifth at the 2019 ACC Championships, while the women’s team placed sixth
• The Demon Deacons return men’s junior runner Zach Facioni and senior runner Jack Tiernan
• Facioni placed fourth at the 2019 ACC Championships, followed by Tiernan with an eighth-place finish
• Junior Elise Wright led the women’s team at last year’s championships with a 14th-place finish