The Southern Conference preseason polls had the Furman Men’s XC team tied for first and the women’s team placed second. What are the teams’ expectations for the year?

Robert Gary: We feel that both teams are talented enough for the title. There is a lot of very good competition in our conference, but we believe that we are close, and we certainly have a shot to win. Even though we ranked highly, I still think that many people consider us an underdog. The men’s placed first despite having less first place votes than University of North Carolina-Greensboro (UNCG), for example. I think that will help motivate our teams to work hard to win.

Who do you think is your toughest competition, and what is the biggest hurdle the teams have to overcome in order to win?

RG: For the men’s team, the top competitor is UNCG, and for the women’s team the toughest is Elon. However, there are many very talented teams we compete against. Our largest hurdle this season is the large number of freshmen on the team. They all have talent and were highly regarded coming out of high school, but it’s a big transition to the college competition. The men have to go from running 5k to 10k. It’s a big leap.

Besides the SoCon Championship, what is the most anticipated race the team will be competing in?

RG: I would say the Pre-National Meet. Many of the best teams in the country will be there to compete, and it’s late enough in the season that our freshmen will be more prepared and comfortable with the college level of competition. It will be a very good test to see how our teams have progressed and improved over the course of the season and how well we stack up with the best in the country.

From last year to this year, who would you say are the most improved runners on your team?

RG: For the women’s side, I would say junior Sinead Haughey. She struggled early in the year, but improved very quickly and ended up being the top performer at the SoCon Championship. It was exciting to see her progress as much as she did. For the men’s, I would say junior Tripp Hurt. He spent most of last summer dealing with an injury, and now that he is healed he has been much more consistent. I think he will have a very solid performance now that he doesn’t have the injury slowing him down.

Have any of the team members stepped into a larger leadership role given the number of younger members?

RG: There are a lot of good leaders on both of our teams, but the one that sticks out the most is senior James Perez. He handled the transition from playing soccer in high school to XC very well and is probably the most sociable person we have. Given the closeness of the men’s and women’s teams, he really managed to be a leader for both and is a great bridge between both teams and even younger and older members of each team. He is someone that really helps to center our group and his leadership has helped tremendously.