Duke cross country looks to underclassmen to replace stars Shaun Thompson, Anima Banks

<p>A young crop of Blue Devils are hoping they can make up for the loss of Anima Banks.</p>

A young crop of Blue Devils are hoping they can make up for the loss of Anima Banks.

Heading into his 26th year at the helm of Duke’s cross country program, men’s cross country head coach Norm Ogilvie is accustomed to the yearly change that comes with collegiate sports.

This year will certainly be no different.

“It’s always a brand new start in the fall when you rest everything,” Ogilvie said. “Whatever you accomplished in the past counts for nothing, unless it’s a sense of tradition. You have to produce again and again, and that’s the challenge.”

The Blue Devils enter this season in transition after losing top runners Shaun Thompson and Anima Banks on the men’s and women’s teams. On the women’s side, Duke also has a new head coach, as Rhonda Riley took over for Christine Engel, who unexpectedly resigned in May.

Riley comes to Duke with substantial coaching experience after spending the last nine seasons at Vanderbilt. During that time, the Commodores appeared in five consecutive NCAA championships and claimed back-to-back South region titles in 2014 and 2015. In addition to doing work with the track and field program, Riley helped Vanderbilt freshman Caroline Pietrzyk become the first All-American in program history.

But Riley’s decision to head to Durham has as much to do with factors off the course than it does on the course.

“Coming from Vanderbilt, I’m used to an academic school and Duke certainly fit that mold,” Riley said. “Duke has a lot of potential to be a very strong cross country program, and I saw a lot of promise in that.”

Riley will likely have to rely on graduate student Madison Granger to lead a young Blue Devil squad. The Belchertown, Mass., native was an All-America honorable mention and NCAA qualifier in the spring in track but has struggled with injuries on occasion and will be under the stewardship of her third head coach during her time at Duke.

The rest of the women’s roster will come down to developing young talent. The Blue Devils bring in one of their most talented recruiting classes in recent memory, highlighted by Sophia Parvizi-Wayne. The London native finished first in the 2013 London Youth Games. Duke will also get a chance to look at a number of new runners, with every team member other than Granger entering the season as a freshman or sophomore.

“To be able to come in as a new coach and structure things how I would like and envision and to be able to grow it together is very exciting to me,” Riley said. “It’s going to be a challenge. We’re asking our underclassman to kind of grow up a little faster in the fact that they’re going to be racing experienced Division I athletes.”

On the men’s side, the Blue Devils return a solid group of middle-distance runners and will look to the 1-2 punch of Daniel Moore and Alec Kunzweiler to lead on and off the course. As a fifth-year senior, Moore will look to build on his strong outings a year ago when he clocked personal bests in the 8K and 10K, as well as the indoor 5,000 meters. Kunzweiler was a second-team All-ACC selection a year ago and will likely be one of the core scorers for Duke this season.

Along with the duo, the Blue Devils will also expect solid performances from the sophomore duo of Stephen Garrett and Nikhil Pulimood, as well as senior Stephen Shine. Around the more experienced group, Duke will bring in seven freshman runners that have impressed Ogilvie so far in practice.

But the big question remains how the team’s youngsters will actually fair when put on the course against strong ACC competition.

Luckily, the Blue Devils will have a veteran in Ogilvie to turn to when the going gets tough.

“The big thing you have to remember when you’ve been doing it a long time is that it’s always new for the new guys,” he said. “You can’t assume that they know anything, so you do have to spend some time going over some stuff the other guys may have heard already.”

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