With top-20 finishes, both teams outperformed expectations but fell short of a national title. The women’s and men’s teams placed seventh and 16th out of the 32-team field, respectively.

This weekend, five WashU teams will compete in postseason action. Here’s a look ahead to an exciting weekend in the world of WashU sports.

WashU has its own, real-life version of Bolton in Lucinda Laughlin: a standout sophomore on the No. 13 WashU cross-country team and an alto for WashU’s all-treble a cappella group, the Evergreens. 

Two Bears placed in the top 10 at the conference meet, with sophomore Lucinda Laughlin earning First-Team All-UAA honors for her fifth-place finish and first-year Max Sudrzynski finishing 10th for Second-Team All-UAA honors.

The women’s team competed against 11 nationally-ranked teams and was able to beat out seven of them. The team competed in two races, the top-ranked gold 6000-meter race and then the lower-ranked blue 6000-meter race.

WashU’s women’s and men’s cross country teams placed 10th and 15th respectively in a 32-team field at the 2024 NCAA Championship in Terre Haute, Indiana on Nov. 23. Graduate-student Cullen Capuano was the Bears’ top finisher and an All-American.

WashU took to the Coogan XC Course in Attleboro, Massachusetts for the 2024 conference championships, where both the men’s team and women’s team delivered strong performances and earned podium finishes. Competing against some of the top programs in the nation, the Bears demonstrated both depth and resilience, as each team secured third place and laid the groundwork for a promising NCAA postseason.

Both teams will begin their season on Sep. 7 with an Alumni Intrasquad Meet and begin collegiate competition on Sep. 21 at the John McNichols Invite in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Over the weekend, the #17 Washington University men’s cross country team finished 17th place at this year’s NCAA Division III country championship meet, while the No. 13 women’s team finished 13th overall.  Senior Alexandra Blake finished first for the Bears and 28th overall in the 6,000-meter race with a time of 21:37.10. Both Capuano and Blake’s performance earned them All-American honors.

Emily Konkus is a senior athlete on Washington University’s women’s cross country team. Konkus serves as one of the co-captains of the team, and was the highest-place finisher for the team at the UAA Championships — one of many collegiate career highlights for the athlete.