Division II berths to nationals on the line in Billings Saturday...

Alexa Shindruk (far left) of Central Washington along with
the Seattle Pacific cross country team look to punch their
tickets to the NCAA D2 national championships
(Paul Merca photo)

While the focus of the nation is on Madison, Wisconsin for Saturday’s NCAA Division I Cross Country Championships, don’t forget that the Division II schools are contesting their regional championships Saturday as well.

Normally, the D2 nationals are the same day as their D1 counterparts, but this year, the D2 national championships are part of a multi-sport national championship festival in Pittsburgh, so the national cross country championships will be held on December 1st.

All four Washington D2 schools are off to Billings, Montana for the West Regionals at Amend Park, hosted by Montana State-Billings, with the men’s 10k going at 10 am Mountain time (9 am, Pacific), and the women’s 6k starting at 11:15 (10:15 Pacific).

The top three teams from each of the eight regional championship races contested around the country automatically advance to Pittsburgh, with ten additional teams selected at-large to fill the field by the NCAA men’s and women’s cross country committee.

Western Washington is the lone men’s team from the state who is ranked in the USTFCCCA national top-25 at number 15.

In the competitive West region, teams ranked ahead of the Vikings include #4 Chico State, and GNAC members Alaska Anchorage at #7, & #11 Simon Fraser, both of who finished ahead at the conference championships two weeks ago.

The only other teams from the West region ranked in the men’s national top 25 are #22 Cal State San Marcos, and #23 Cal Poly Pomona.

On the women’s side, Seattle Pacific enters the regional championships ranked #12, while Western Washington is at #21.

Teams from the West region ranked nationally include #5 Chico State, GNAC champion Alaska Anchorage at #7, #10 and GNAC runner-up Simon Fraser, #13 Azusa Pacific, #16 Point Loma Nazarene, and #19 Cal State Stanislaus, making the West region perhaps the most competitive region nationally, with eight nationally ranked teams.

After the 24 teams from the eight regions are advanced, the committee will decide which ten teams advance to nationals based on strength of schedule and who has beaten which teams over the course of the regular season.

Additionally, two individuals per regional race who are not part of a team advancing to nationals will get to run in the national championship race, with an additional eight individuals selected by the committee at-large, which gives runners like Central Washington’s Alexa Shindruk, who qualified for nationals in the 10000m on the track last spring, an opportunity to advance.

The link to the host school's release is available here, which has a link to live results.

NOTE:  The sports information office of Montana State University-Billings, USTFCCCA, and the NCAA contributed to this report.