XC slate includes Sept. 19 home meet
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Cross Country
FREDONIA, N.Y. -- The annual Fredonia State Invitational is slated for Sept. 19, the Blue Devils' lone home meet and one of six regular-season meets on the 2009 cross country schedule released today.
The season opens Sept. 5 with the Buffalo State Invitational at Beaver Island State Park on Grand Island. The Blue Devils follow that up with a Sept. 12 trip to Penn State. "It (the Penn State meet) will be a great meet," head coach Jeff Beck said, "to run against some (NCAA Division I) competition along with some strong D-III schools."
Next up is the Fredonia State Invitational, which will again be contested in scenic Lake Erie State Park in the Chautauqua County Town of Portland, approximately five miles from the Fredonia State campus. A list of teams entered in the meet will be released at a later date.
After a two-week break from competition, the Blue Devils get back at it Oct. 3 with the Geneseo Invitational at Letchworth State Park. It is the same course that will be used for the NCAA Atlantic Regional later in the fall, so Beck expects a full field.
Trips to the Cortland Invitational on Oct. 10 and the Oberlin Invitational on Oct. 17 close out the regular season. The Cortland course is also site of the SUNYAC meet, while the Oberlin meet last fall produced several men and women who later earned NCAA Division III All-American recognition, as well as full squads who qualified for nationals. "We are traveling there," Beck said, "to get another big-meet experience against some top D-III schools and runners."
Only qualified runners continue on into the championship portion of the season: the SUNYAC meet Oct. 31 at Cortland, the NCAA Atlantic Regional Nov. 14 at Geneseo, and the NCAA championship meet Nov. 21 at Baldwin-Wallace College.