BOSTON, Mass.—Led by top-five individual finishes from the junior duo of Sadie Sigfstead (Edmonton, Alta.) and Emma McGill (Lebanon, N.J.), Villanova placed fourth in a close team race at the Coast-to-Coast Battle in Beantown on Friday afternoon. Sigfstead was the runner-up out of more than 150 runners with a time of 17:04.9 over 5,000 meters to help the Wildcats finish in front of two other BIG EAST squads at Franklin Park.
 
INDIVIDUAL RESULTS
 

• Sigfstead paced the Villanova lineup with her second place finish in a field of 160 runners. It is her second consecutive race to start the season in which she has been the Wildcats top runner. Sigfstead was previously the individual champion of the Main Line Invitational two weeks ago, a performance which earned her BIG EAST Female Athlete of the Week honors.

 

• McGill finished fifth overall at Friday's meet with a time of 17:10.6. The present and future potential of the Villanova lineup was on full display, as the team's five scoring runners featured four juniors and a freshman academically. Junior Margaret Carroll (Mount Wolf, Pa.) was third in the lineup and 20^th overall in 17:42.4, followed by junior Emily Robinson (Rogers, Ark.) who was 31^st (17:49.5) and freshman Tilly O'Connor (Spring Lake, N.J.) who came in 66^th (18:24.5).

 

• Senior Elizabeth Vaughn (Dayton, Ohio) and sophomore Kinsey Pogue (Danville, Calif.) rounded out the Wildcats lineup with times of 18:27.3 and 18:33.7, respectively. The top four Villanova finishers were separated by less than 40 seconds at the finish line.

 
TEAM IMPLICATIONS
 

• The Coast-to-Coast Battle in Beantown could have been called a Wire-to-Wire battle based on the closeness of the team competition. The second through seventh place teams were separated by a mere 40 points and it was movement within the final 2,000 meters of the race that ultimately determined the team results.

 

• Villanova came in fourth with 118 points and finished ahead of BIG EAST teams Connecticut (5^th, 126) and St. John's (14^th, 405). Three of the teams in the field are from the Mid-Atlantic region, including runner-up Penn (103) and the Wildcats along with sixth-place Princeton (136). Villanova scored a win over a Tigers team that it trailed by one spot in this week's Mid-Atlantic Region poll released by the United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.

 

• In addition to the conference and regional competition, the meet was a chance for Villanova to earn points by finishing in front of teams from different regions. This scoring system is used in part to determine bids for the NCAA Championships later this season.

 
NEXT UP
 

• Villanova is rounding into strong form as the 2023 cross country campaign nears its midpoint. The next competition for the Wildcats is on October 14 at the XC-23 Pre-Nationals hosted by the University of Virginia. The meet takes place at Panorama Farms in Earlysville, Va. where the NCAA Championships will take place this November.