Women’s Cross Country Team Makes NCAA Nationals Debut At Stillwater

Returning to action this season for the Lady Flames cross-country team meant finally running again after an offseason that lasted more than 13 months. But it also meant a historic opportunity for the program – competing in the NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships for the first time in Liberty’s history. 

Out of seven Lady Flames who competed at the championship meet March 15, Liberty had two top-100 finishers, Adelyn Ackley (No. 66) and Calli Doan (No. 85). Ackley and Doan both got off to a slow start, positioned at No. 183 and No. 182 respectively after reaching the 1,000-meter checkpoint. Both knew the course was very steep, so they wanted to pace themselves, unlike many of the other runners who started the race hot out of the gates.

“Heading into the race we wanted to surrender the results to God and praise him for the opportunity to be there,” Ackley said. “How awesome is it that we were chosen, even though we have never made it to nationals before as a team? We were just super grateful, super excited.”

Ackley and Doan managed to make the large jump in competition as the race went on, knowing when to pace themselves and when to run hard. At the 5,000-meter checkpoint, Ackley and Doan were in 103rd and 113th place respectively. In the last 1,000 meters of the race, Ackley moved up 37 spots and Doan moved 28.

“I was pleased with it,” Doan said. “We both had goals of top 40 and we didn’t get there, but I was happy with the way we raced it. We went more conservatively and moved up a bunch (in rankings). The course (in Stillwater, Oklahoma) is super challenging, so as a team we started out more conservatively and then we were able to pass a bunch of people throughout the race.”

Normally, regionals are the most pivotal part of the season, but with the way the NCAA set up the qualifications for nationals, each race had a heightened sense of meaning, and many of the runners knew they had to leave it all out on the course to achieve their goals. 

“Going into the season, we had the lofty goal of going to nationals, so we were super motivated as a whole,” Doan said. 

The team will have a quick turnaround of two weeks after this event to prepare for its upcoming outdoor track season, unlike the usual full month in between seasons. However, Ackley and Doan seem more than ready for it after a motivational speech from Coach Rachel Johnson.

“I think that really helped us keep in mind that we were going to keep racing this spring, and we needed to focus on the season to come,” Ackley said.

Kevin Gora is a Sports Reporter. Follow him on Twitter at @kevgora.