Tristian Merchant
Here’s a puzzler: How did Anchorage’s Tristian Merchant of dynastic and top-ranked Northern Arizona University win the men’s Freshman of the Year honor at the Big Sky Cross Country Championships on Friday when he finished as the third-fastest freshman in the field?
Quick answer: He was the fastest true freshman in the field.
Longer story long: The two freshmen who finished ahead of Merchant – runner-up Nico Young, his teammate, and sixth-place Ben Perrin of Montana State – are technically freshman, but not really. Both are only designated freshman because the NCAA during the worst of the pandemic decided not to dock athletes a season of eligibility with so many seasons were canceled or shortened by coronavirus. Young actually finished fourth at the 2020 NCAA Championships, which were held earlier this year. And Perrin is a red-shirt freshman of sorts – he previously competed in one cross country season and one indoor track season.
So, Merchant, the former Anchorage Christian School star, truly deserved the Freshman of the Year honor for his 15th-place finish for conference champion NAU, which has merely won four of the last five NCAA titles. Merchant finished as the Lumberjacks’ fifth and final scorer, clocking 24 minutes, 15.4 seconds for eight kilometers (five miles) on the wet, muddy Meriwether National Golf Course, uh, course in Hillsboro, Ore., near Portland. Merchant moved up three places in the second half of the race and was NAU’s fifth and final scoring runner.
Sadie Tuckwood
Meanwhile, former Juneau-Douglas standout Sadie Tuckwood of Gonzaga finished 20th at the West Coast Conference Championships in Concord, Calif. Tuckwood, a freshman who was Gonzaga’s fifth scorer, covered the six-kilometer course in 21:22.3.
Also in the West, former ACS runner Blake Bennett of Grand Canyon earned 15th place at the Western Athletic Conference Championships in Riverside, Calif., to lead his team. Bennett, a junior, covered eight kilometers in 24:26.4
Out East in Boston, former South High runner Lucy Young, a freshman, finished 32nd overall, and third among William & Mary runners, at the Colonial Athletic Association Championships. She posted a six-kilometer time of 23:18.5 on the 6K course.