CMC75 Moments: 2019 Men's Cross Country Edges Pomona-Pitzer for SCIAC Championship
As part of the buildup to the 75th Anniversary celebration for Claremont McKenna College (visit CMC's 75th Anniversary Countdown Page to learn more), we are reliving many of the great moments from CMS athletic department history over the 75-day countdown from April 17 to July 1. If you were a part of this great moment and would like to add to the memories, or if you would like to submit your memories of your own favorite CMS Athletics moments, fill out the form on our main 75th Anniversary page.
Great Moments from 75 Years of Athletics
2019 Men's Cross Country: Stags Defeat Pomona-Pitzer in SCIAC Tiebreaker
The CMS Men's Cross Country program was riding a long streak of qualifying as a team for nationals heading into the 2019 season, standing at 11 in a row. In recent seasons, though, the SCIAC Championship had been a bit of an elusive target, after coming in third in the 2017 and 2018 seasons behind Pomona-Pitzer and Occidental. In 2018, the Stags bounced back to tie Pomona-Pitzer at the NCAA West Regionals to earn their 11th nationals bid in a row, but in 2019, they were determined to have a better showing at SCIACs.
Indeed, CMS accomplished just that, winning a dramatic championship where the winner wasn't known until several minutes after the race had completed. Both the Stags and Sagehens tied with 31 points, and cross country tiebreakers are rare and the criteria aren't always known, so everyone had to wait and see what the final announcement was. As it turned out, the last push from first-year Henry Pick to get into 10th place ahead of a Sagehen in 11th proved to be the difference as CMS had the higher finisher in three of the five positions, earning the SCIAC crown for the first time since 2016. Pick was named the National Runner of the Week by the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association for his role in giving the Stags the title.
Senior Thomas D'Anieri, who missed his junior cross country season with an injury, was the individual SCIAC Champion and went on to finish third at the NCAA Division III Championships, the second-highest finish for a Stag in program history behind David Jiuliano's second-place finish in 2001. He was named the SCIAC Athlete of the Year, while Pick was named the SCIAC Newcomer of the Year. Joining them on the All-SCIAC first team were Stevie Stienberg, Kyril Van Schendel, and Miles Christensen, while Will Kimball, Daniel Krasemann and Wilson Ives were named to the second team.
CMS went on to earn a sixth-place finish at the NCAA Championships, the second-highest finish in program history behind the fifth place finish earned in 2016.
Will Kimball:
Performing at SCIACs meant a lot to us, particularly in proving ourselves after a couple of mediocre SCIAC performances in the past couple of years. We had a chip on our shoulder going into it, and while we knew we were capable of it, we knew it would take everyone's best efforts to redeem ourselves.
That was an incredible feeling when they announced we had won. There was definitely some speculation that we pulled it off, but nobody wanted to prematurely celebrate. It's a weird thing to celebrate the win when you are still completely exhausted from racing, but all the guys were stoked. We regrouped and gave off one last chant as a whole team. Still, we knew there was more work to be done for nationals, and we also still wanted to make sure the Athenas won their race, too (they did, by a lot). Once both the men's and women's teams had won, it was time to celebrate.
Even in injury, Thomas works harder than most people will ever work in their lives. It had been frustrating for the team to see that despite all his efforts in the alt room, his return to running had been slow, so when he was finally able to return in full force, we were all extremely excited. Not only did Thomas end up overcoming his injury to win the individual SCIAC championship, he scored third individually at nationals. It was amazing for everybody to see his hard work pay off.
My favorite memory of that season was probably at the UC Riverside meet in mid-September. At this early point in the season our team knew we had some potential, but showing up at Riverside with everyone performing great and beating Pomona-Pitzer for the first time in a couple years (with everyone racing) proved to us how much we were capable of. That race shot us up in the national rankings and put us in the national discussion. The whole team just had such an excited energy moving on from that point, and like many of my teammates, I walked away with a new personal record from the race, which I am still very proud of.
Stevie Steinberg:
We suffered a few disappointing finishes in my first two years at SCIACs. And as strange as it sounds, SCIACs might be even bigger than regionals or nationals for us. It's our last whole-team meet of the season, and there's a special energy to a championship where anyone can contribute. Especially as we came to see ourselves over the season as national contenders, we knew we first had to get back to our program tradition of SCIAC Championship victories.
As someone whose weak final kick cost the team a couple points, I had white knuckles every moment we were waiting. Miles Christensen came flying past me in the last straightaway to undo some of my damage, and that gave me some comfort. But once we tallied up the points and realized that we were tied with Pomona-Pitzer, we just crossed our fingers that we wouldn't lose a tiebreaker. Part of me expected a tie final (like the 2018 regionals). When they announced that we won, I almost shouted my lungs out. It felt like a Lakers buzzer-beater in Staples against the Celtics. I beelined over to Miles and probably crushed his lungs a little bit, hugging him in gratitude. The whole team then crammed into a group huddle, whooping and hugging and giving props to everyone who made the W happen. Even now, thinking about it makes me want to lace my shoes up and get some mileage in.
Thomas has had one of the strangest, most convoluted, most confusing, and most impressive trajectories of a great runner that I've ever seen. From setting school records as a sophomore, to tearing his Achilles at nationals that spring, to fourteen months of that injury being undiagnosed and him trying to run virtually tendon-less. To hours and hours of sweating on the stationary bike, to Olympic-level doctors, to races started but unfinished, and then to a SCIAC individual title and a top-3 placing at nationals. I'm a massive fan of sports, pro and amateur, but they are absolutely meaningless without the narratives and paths that connect seasons and teams. Despite all the twists and turns, he lived up to his enormous potential, and if anyone can't appreciate that story, they can't really hope to understand why we compete.
A big part of our team culture is the idea that any of us can be a leader: anyone can step up, anyone can set the tone, anyone can be the hero on any given Saturday. All season long, Henry stepped up and managed the stress of being a top guy on this championship-level team. With people like Henry, Daniel Krasemann, and a whole bunch of first-years that just missed the postseason cut, our program's future is bright.
I'll never forget the moments where we're all unified. When we get started on a brutal workout at 6am, when I look around the bus on the way to a meet, when we all go to Collins breakfast together, hungry and desperate for Denver Scramble. Two things stick with me. First, when a group of my teammates flew out to Louisville to cheer us on at nationals, and then sprinted around a freezing, muddy course for miles to give the team whatever they could. Second, the group hug we had after winning SCIACs. These days, when being together is so difficult, no memory feels better than that moment of coming together, as one.
Thomas D'Anieri:
It still gives me chills to think about that day. That title was the culmination of four years of dedication to running hard, but more importantly, to supporting each other. We won my freshman year and then missed out badly the next two years, but throughout that time we were showing up each day and slowly putting in the work to get better, even if we did not always see the results. For about a year of that period I was badly injured and spent many long, hard hours crushing myself in the spin room to try to get in shape, while doing whatever else I could to support my teammates. At the same time, my teammates and coaches were always encouraging me and treating me like I was out there with them everyday. So to have had the opportunity to come back and give everything that I had for my team--and to see them put forth the same kind of effort for each other--in a way that ended with such a tangible expression of success is something I will always cherish.
As soon as I saw Pick cross the line in 10th, I was pretty sure we had it. Henry embodied what it meant to "run like a freshman" in the good sense of the term. He did not race like he had some pre-ordained position he would finish in, or person he would pace off of, he just went out there and blew the doors off of it. It reminded me a lot of how I ran at SCIACs my freshman year. I finished in a similar position, we also won by an incredibly close margin over PP that year, and I, like Henry, was the freshman who popped off to secure the win. So what I was really thinking about when they announced the results was "well, the next generation has arrived" in the same way that I began my career.
My teammates signed a card for me at the banquet after the season was over. I am sure this happens in every sport for basically every senior, but their words meant the world to me. I think I had a reputation throughout my four years as being a very intense person, and I was also known for being one of the faster people on the team. But neither of those things in and of itself makes a difference for anyone, and deep down I always worried that my legacy was going to be just that--as a fast guy who trained really hard. Reading the words on that paper made all of those fears evaporate. They showed me that I had been able to make for my teammates the kind of impact that those who came before me had on me, and that--not someone's PRs or titles--is how I define a successful CMS career.
2019 CMS Men's Cross Country Roster
Head Coach: John Goldhammer
Assistant Coaches: Collin Christensen, Megumi Abe
Gus Albach (Fy., CMC)
Xoaquin Baca (Fy., HMC)
Noah Battaglia (Fy., CMC)
Rafael Burger (Fy., HMC)
Miles Christensen (So., HMC)
Thomas D'Anieri (Sr., CMC)
Max Denning (Sr., HMC)
Kai Dettman (Fy., HMC)
Thomas Fleming (So., HMC)
Jake Gill (So., HMC)
Alekzander Grijalva (Fy., HMC)
Evan Hassman (Jr., HMC)
Alexander Hirsch (So., HMC)
Gage Hornung (Jr., CMC)
Wilson Ives (Sr., HMC)
Garrick Jensen (So. HMC)
Will Kimball (Jr., CMC)
Kaito Komoriya (So., CMC)
Daniel Krasemann (Fy., CMC)
Dustin Lind (So., CMC)
Brooks MacDonald (Sr., HMC)
Bennett Mountain (Jr., HMC)
Arjun Natarajan (Jr., HMC)
Noah Nevens (Fy., HMC)
Declan O'Neill (Fy., HMC)
Luke Ostrander (Jr., CMC)
Henry Pick (Fy., HMC)
Daniel Sealand (Jr., HMC)
Mihira Sogal (Fy., HMC)
Stevie Steinberg (Jr., HMC)
Kyril Van Schendel (So., CMC)
Will Wallace (Fy., CMC)
Adam Wilkinson (So., CMC)