Kaley Richards of U.Mass-Lowell earns XC All American honors

Richards Garners Cross Country All-American Honor, Second A-A in Three Days
Monday, March 15, 2021

Kaley Richards (U.Mass-Lowell) earned her second All American honor in  three days on Monday, placing 30th at the NCAA Division 1 Cross Country Championship held in Stillwater, Oklahoma on the Oklahoma State Univerisity
course. Her time over the 6 kilometer course was 20:46.9; the race was won by Mercy Chelangat of the University of Alabama in 20:01.1

On Saturday, Richards ran to fourth in the mile at the Indoor Track & Field Championships held at the University of Arkansas.  The weekend's two awards were the first honors at the Divsion 1 level by a U.Mass.Lowell women in each sport. 

Five other New England collegiat women competed in the race.
30.Kaley Richards   U.Mass-Lowell  20:46.9
48.Lotte Black      Rhode Island   21:03.6 
62.Lauren White     Boston College 21:12.6 
99 Maria Coffin     Providence     21:29.5
161.Andrea Claeson  Boston U       21:56.5
240.Ashley Dann     Central Conn   23:08.7

Top New England men's finisher was Chris Alford, also from UML; he finished 70th in the field in his second appearance at Nationals in a time of 31:11.6 Winner Connor Mantz of BYU clocked in at 29:26.1.
Two other New England men qualified and ran the 10 kilometer circuit.
70. Chris Alford     UMass.Lowell   31:11.6
174.Eric Van Der Els Connecticut   32:26.7
DNF Kyle Cloutier    UMass.Lowell

New England high school products contributed to their collegiate teams in the meet.   Bay State freshmen Lucy Jenks (Newton South, 92nd, 21:28.6), and Grace Connolly (Natick, 181st, 22:11.6) helped Stanford to a podium-placing third as a team.  Jenks was USATF-NE Athlete of the Month in January 2020.
Maggie Donahue (Wellesley MA HS) placed 32nd and was part of Georgetown's scoring squad as was Maegan Doody (Oyster River NH HS) in 229th. 
Showing the women's field depth, 124 runners finshed between 21:01 and 22:00

In the men's race, former La Salle (RI) HS teammates DJ Principe (72nd, 31:12.3) and Jack Salisbury (129th, 31:56.9) were part of their Stanford and Georgetown scoring teams, respectively, and Nick Steele (Bromfield MA HS) placed 132nd representing Villanova.