Although their final season together did not end in a national championship, the six seniors on the women's cross country team have little else about which to be disappointed.
Prior to Duke's third place finish at the NCAA Championships Nov. 21 in Terre Haute, Ind., the top-ranked Blue Devils won every meet they participated in by scoring 33 points or less in each race. Their victories included defending titles at both the NCAA Southeast Regional meet Nov. 12 and the ACC Championships Oct. 31.
Duke's season was also filled with record-setting performances. The Blue Devils had a conference-best seven All-ACC performers and won the ACC Championships by setting all-time records in both margin of victory and lowest point total. Soon after the meet, head coach Kevin Jermyn was named the ACC Coach of the Year for the second straight time.
"Obviously this season we accomplished a lot," Jermyn said. "I would say this was our best season in Duke history. The real big step was our consistency of our top girls in their performances."
Seniors Shannon Rowbury and Clara Horowitz led the Blue Devils by together placing first and second in every race but their last. The pair also earned numerous athlete of the week honors from both the University and the conference.
Rowbury secured four individual titles this season, including the ACC and NCAA Southeast Regional crowns. Horowitz won Duke's opening meet and was the first Blue Devil to cross the finish line at the NCAA Championships.
Fellow seniors Natasha Roetter, Sally Meyerhoff and co-captains Laura Stanley and Liz Wort were joined by freshman Whitney Anderson to round out Duke's core runners and NCAA Championship competitors. Next year's squad, however, will be without at least three of those seven-Rowbury, Meyerhoff and Wort will no longer be eligible to compete next season.
"For me I'm really glad I have another season, but it's been really hard because it's the end of our senior class all together," Stanley said. "It's definitely bittersweet. There's no question that we still have the potential to be a very good team next year."
Jermyn said Duke will draw from its pool of talented freshmen and redshirt athletes to fill in the gaps the three seniors' departures will create.
"Obviously it will be a little bit of a different team dynamic because there will be different girls, but our goals will still be the same," said Jermyn, who is still in search of the program's first national title.
Duke has started training for the upcoming spring track season, but the team has slightly relaxed its workouts from the level of intensity the harriers had sustained all season in preparation for the NCAA Championships.
"We took last week and this week as a chance to give our bodies a rest with some light running and mileage," Stanley said. "Basically we've been training really hard since July without a break. Our bodies need a physical break. We need to regenerate both our bodies and emotions."
Duke did not slip from its No. 1 ranking after it secured the top spot in the first regular season poll, Sept. 21. The squad was the favorite entering the NCAA Championships and was expected to best its 2004 runner-up performance.
"It was not the end we were all hoping for," Wort said of a group of seniors that helped elevate the program to one of the nation's best. "It's a hard way to end your career, feeling like you could have done more. If we had run at our potential we probably could have won without any problem."
Last year's finish was the Blue Devils' highest in program history and came in the same year that Duke won its first ACC Championship.
"We've really sort of set the standard for the program," Stanley said. "That's huge. In the years to come, eventually one of our teams is going to win a national championship. Duke cross country is sort of on the map now. The standard has been raised."
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