Duke hosted Liberty in a dual meet Saturday, but if you stood at the finish line, you probably would have thought you were watching the Blue Devils in a practice run.
Nine Duke runners, led by Megan Sullivan, crossed the finish line before a Liberty runner interrupted the Duke conga line. By sweeping the top five spots, Duke recorded a perfect score of 15 in routing the Flames, 15-50, prompting Director of Track Al Buehler to once again give his "serious quality racing" stamp on the race.
"I'm happy because for the first mile, our lead group ran as a pack," said Art Smith, who was acting as coach in the absence of Jan Samuelson-Ogilvie. "We ran better as a team than we did last week [at the Fordham Invitational]."
Sullivan eventually broke from the lead pack at around the one-mile mark and finished the race about 100 yards ahead of her closest pursuer. Her time of 18:12 marked a 34-second improvement over her time last season on the same course in the Duke-Yale meet, when she finished second overall.
Ellie Culp, running in only her second cross-country race at Duke, trailed Sullivan across the finish line at 18:47. After sitting out all of last season due to a knee injury, Culp has rebounded to finish second on the team in Duke's first two races of the season.
"[Culp] did a nice job again," Smith said. "She surprised a lot of people, but probably not herself, with her second-place showing at Fordham. She's about at the same place Megan Sullivan was in last year, so she shows a lot of potential."
If Culp, who hails from Salt Lake City, can indeed continue on the same progression curve that Sullivan has been on her first two years, Duke will boast a talented top group of young runners.
"It's been really great this year to be able to represent Duke and wear the Blue Devils jersey," Culp said. "Because last year was really frustrating for me, it's really nice to help the team this year."
And Duke's infusion of youth doesn't just stop at Sullivan and Culp. Maddy Woodmansee, Katie Atlas and Annie Wickman, all freshmen, rounded out the top five by posting times of 18:55, 18:58 and 19:05, respectively.
"We have a really good freshman class this year," Culp said. "Last year we changed coaches and a lot of runners quit, so it's really nice to have some fresh runners."
Woodmansee's third-place finish was particularly impressive since it came in her collegiate debut after sitting out last week's Fordham Invitational with the flu.
But it was Duke's performance Saturday that had the Liberty Flames feeling sick.
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