Top 15 picks below for the girls individuals at NXN Southeast. All 5 individual qualifiers are back from last year's group that did exceptionally well at nationals in Oregon with many All-American showings by a young group of qualifiers including defending race champ Rachel McArthur (VA) along with Taylor Cuneo (TN), Rafaella Gibbons (FL), Elly Henes (NC), and Kate Murphy (VA). Henes is the only senior among bunch as well for this year.
However, its not guaranteed that all five will qualify again for nationals. There are some impactful freshmen and newcomers in the region who could spoil a full reunion including Delaware state champ Keelin Hays, a freshmen at Tatnall as well as another Delaware state champ in Padua sophomore Lydia Olivere. Virginia 3A state champ Sophia Link, a freshmen at Blacksburg as well as South Carolina state champ Jessica Crowley, an 8th grader at Riverside could both finish deep in the top 10, but also be helping advance their teams to Nike Cross Nationals and not count towards the 5 individual qualifiers.
Question marks on the returning individual national qualifiers to be answered this week. McArthur is running in her first race in nearly a month after suffering a quad injury that sat her out of her Virginia regional and state meet, so she will test her fitness and health for first time on Saturday.
Gibbons and Henes both lost at their state meets (though Henes was a runner-up to a national caliber Nevada Mareno), while Murphy's time at the Virginia state meet in winning the 6A title was not one of her best times of the year after two stellar runs at Burke Lake Park for conference and regional meet.
Among the returnees, the 2015 U.S. junior 1500 meter champion Murphy is on the team with the best shot of qualifying for nationals in the Virginia 6A state champion Lake Braddock squad.
Georgia state champ Serena Tripodi, Kentucky state champ Michaela Rinehart, and Tennessee state champ Claire Cheeseman all ran very well in last year's regional race just off the bubble for national qualifying, so all three will look to not let any separation created themselves as the race's front pack this time around.
Maryland's best girls individuals in the race figure to be among Montgomery County's best three runners in Walter Johnson duo of Abbey Green and Emily Murphy along with Paint Branch's Bethlehem Taye. Green and Taye ran right around 19 minutes on the challenging Hereford 3 mile state course and could see themselves drop a minute in time on the fast 5K course at WakeMed. Top 15-20 finishes certainly possible, but any individual national qualifiers among Team Maryland would be a huge surprise.
NXN Southeast Region Girls Top 15 Individual Picks
10. Jessie Crowley (Riverside SC)
11. Michaela Rinehart (Lexington Catholic KY)
12. Abigail Green (Walter Johnson MD)
13. Claire Cheeseman (Brentwood Academy TN)
14. Samantha Marin (Blacksburg VA)
15. Cate Ambrose (Riverside SC)