We're Not The Ones

Mick Byrne, who turned Iona into a national cross country power, will head into Monday's NCAA Cross Country Championships with the nation's top-ranked team — his Wisconsin Badgers. But Byrne is downplaying the notion that his team is favored for the title.

Here's what he said at his Monday press conference:

There’s four or five great teams. Being ranked No. 1, you’ve got to get out there next weekend and you’ve got to get five guys across the line before anyone else. We’re looking forward to this opportunity. We’re looking forward to the challenge. Certainly last year’s champion, Oklahoma State, two-time champion Oklahoma State, I mean, on paper, everybody knows they’re certainly the team to beat.

They haven’t run one of their top guys yet. I know Coach (Dave) Smith from Oklahoma State has said that he’s not running, but they probably have a few tricks up their sleeve for next weekend. So we’re expecting that he probably will run.

Oklahoma, Martin Smith’s team, former Badger, they’re a real good club, too. Oklahoma and Oklahoma State kind of had the same type of meet that we at the regional meet on Saturday with Indiana. They kind of just cruised through it and didn’t look like they exerted too much energy.

Certainly Colorado is real good. They’ve got some big guns up front just like any of the top four teams, and we expect they’re going to have a good run at it also. And Stanford, a perennial powerhouse.

So it’s going to come down next Monday to which team gets the top five guys across the line first. We’d like to think that we have a shot at that, but I’m going out on a limb today and definitely putting Oklahoma State as the pre-race favorite. They’ve got to be, two-time defending champion. They’re not going to hand that to anybody.

NCAA.com will webcast each of the NCAA Cross Country Championships this weekend for free. Links to the actual webcast will likely be posted on NCAA.com a few hours before start time.