![\"\"](\"http:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Hostettler.jpeg\")
<\/a>Junior Michelle Hostettler and the Rockets open the cross country season at the Mel Brodt Collegiate
Opener Friday, Aug. 30.<\/p><\/div>Senior Athena Welsh led the Rockets last season, earning an individual berth at the NCAA Cross Country Championship. Welsh placed second at the MAC Championship (20:37.9) and came in 17th place at the Great Lakes Regional (20:55.2). <\/p>\n
Sophomore Claire Steigerwald earned MAC Freshman of the Year honors after landing in 19th place with a time of 21:43.4 at the MAC Championships and posted a time of 22:11.7 at the NCAA Great Lakes Regional. <\/p>\n
Senior Petronela Simiuc clocked a 21:50.5 at the MAC Championship to place 22nd and posted a time of 22:47.5 at the NCAA Regional. <\/p>\n
Junior Michelle Hostettler posted a time of 21:38.8 to take 16th at the MAC Championship and stopped the clock at 21:54.1 at the NCAA Great Lakes Regional.<\/p>\n
“Having a preseason No. 1 ranking is a nice complement to our program and to the group of athletes we have here at Toledo,” said Head Coach Andrea Grove-McDonough. “Having said that, there is a long season ahead of us, and we are more concerned about holding a championship trophy as the end of October than what the rankings might say this far out. There is not a lot of separation between us and a couple of other MAC teams. We need to stay hungry and focused to bring a MAC Championship trophy back to Toledo.”<\/p>\n
Toledo tallied seven first-place votes while last season’s champion, Eastern Michigan, was tabbed to finish second with three first-place votes. Miami, Northern Illinois and Akron were chosen third, fourth, and fifth, respectively.<\/p>\n
2019 Women’s MAC Cross Country Preseason Poll (First-place votes) – points The coaches have voted: The women’s cross country team was picked to finish in the top spot in the Mid-American Conference this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":846,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,56,1],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56323"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/846"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56323"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56327,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56323\/revisions\/56327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n1. Toledo (7) \u2014 135<\/strong>
\n2. Eastern Michigan (3) \u2014 119
\n3. Miami (1) \u2014 114
\n4. Northern Illinois \u2014 113
\n5. Akron (1) \u2014 99
\n6. Central Michigan \u2014 90
\n7. Bowling Green \u2014 71
\n8. Kent State \u2014 50
\n9. Western Michigan \u2014 45
\n10. Ball State \u2014 43
\n11. Ohio \u2014 36
\n12. Buffalo \u2014 21<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"