Huskies off to East Lansing for Friday's B1G Ten cross country championships...

Championship week for Washington's five NCAA Division I schools begins Friday in East Lansing, Michigan, as the University of Washington heads east for the Big Ten Championships hosted by Michigan State University.

Action gets underway at 7:35 am Pacific time (9:35 local time) at the Forest Akers East Golf Course with the men's 8k race, and the women's 6k starting exactly one hour later.

The Washington men, who on paper at the beginning of the season, looked like they were good enough to qualify for the NCAA championships, now go into the Big Tens with more questions.

UPDATE (11:15 AM) Evan Jenkins (Paul Merca photo), who was on the entry list, did not travel, while Tyrone Gorze, who was a scorer on the track over 10000 meters last spring, is being redshirted.

Jenkins, along with 3:52 miler Tyler Bilyard, and freshman Owen Powell, were listed on Washington's original entry list posted on the timing site.

Each team is allowed to run ten athletes, so the Huskies will make their final changes before the meet.

Washington's performance at the Nuttycombe in Wisconsin raised some eyebrows after finishing 28th in the 32 team field.

It didn't help matters that both Reuben Reina (#2413) and Josiah Tostenson (#2414/Paul Merca photo) failed to finish.

Going into the Big Tens, the Huskies, who finished second last year behind Wisconsin, will face four nationally ranked teams in number 10 Oregon, number 13 Michigan State, number 15 Wisconsin and number 25 Michigan.

The UW women's team, which goes into the Big Ten ranked number 20 in the country, has been without Julia David-Smith so far this season, though she made an appearance at home against SeattleU in the season opener, in what essentially was a glorified workout wearing team racing kits.

David-Smith had a pretty extensive summer racing season, which included the European U23 championships and the World University Games, where she won the 5000.  David-Smith will not race Friday.

Mia Cochran, who went to Europe to race this summer, and Maeve Stiles have led the way for Washington so far this season. Chloe Foerster, who also raced quite a bit in Europe this summer, is rounding into form.

In David-Smith's absence, Abby DeVeau, a first-year squad member but a senior academically who played for the UW club rugby team for several years, has been the big surprise. In her first big collegiate cross country race, DeVeau was their fourth runner, finishing 93rd overall at Nuttycombe in 21:05.

Besides prohibitive favorite Oregon, currently ranked number 4, Washington will face number 8 Northwestern, which has been one of the pleasant surprises of the season. They'll also face number 12 Penn State, number 19 Wisconsin, and number 24 Michigan State.

The link to live results for the Big Ten is available here. The Big Ten Network will televise the championships starting at 7:30 am Pacific time (Channel 1313 on Seattle area Comcast or on the FOX Sports App). 

NOTE: The Big Ten Conference and the sports information office of the University of Washington, contributed to this report.

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