2025 D3 XC Conference Recap
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The sun has risen and set on another conference weekend. As consumers tear spider webs off bushes and compost rotting jack-o-lanterns, they shift their focus to the second major holiday in the end-of-year trilogy. In like manner, the end of XC season has three major holidays: conference, regionals, and nationals; and cross country runners everywhere are now trading their conference costumes for regional plates of turkey.
All over the country, teams impressed at their respective conference championships, of which there were 42 in D3. Some flew cross-country, like Salisbury (Md.) heading all the way to Sunnyvale, Calif., others enjoyed the luxury of a pre-race sleep in their own beds, and everyone else found themselves somewhere in between–anxious fingers twisting teammates’ hair into race-day braids while keeping balance on humming charter buses or slapping rubbery hotel scrambled eggs on thin slices of toast after an overnight trip.
When the time finally came to put a whole season’s worth of work to the test, some ran races they will not soon forget, for the joy of conference weekend lives in the unexpected.
One of the biggest headlines of the weekend came from Hope men, who won MIAA Championships for the first time in 39 years, toppling Calvin’s 37-year reign, the second longest ongoing conference winning streak in D3. Other teams saw similar rises to power. Northwestern St. Paul women found themselves back on top of the UMAC after a 25-year drought. Tufts men stopped Williams men from adding a sixth consecutive NESCAC win, and Ohio Northern women took the OAC crown for the first time in 13 years.
And though a unique joy is reserved for a return to glory, so is there a special feeling for chartering territory one has never traversed before. Thirteen programs saw their first conference titles in history this past weekend, with four conferences seeing new victors in both the men’s and the women’s race. The PAC even saw three first-time champions, with Geneva sweeping both titles, and Washington and Jefferson tying for the women’s race victory, and Trinity Texas, who had never won an SAA title on either side, won both the men’s and women’s races.
First-time respective conference champions:
ASC- Hardin-Simmons men’s team & East Texas Baptist University women’s team
MIAA- Trine women’s team
MAC- Lebanon Valley women’s team
NCAC- OWU women’s team & JCU men’s team
PAC- Geneva men’s team, Geneva & Washington & Jefferson women’s teams
Skyline- Sarah Lawrence women’s team
SAA- Trinity (Tx) men’s & women’s team
United East- Penn State Berks men’s team
Even the most dominant teams in D3 had their humble beginnings, and sometimes dominance starts with a single conference win. While first-time winners finish out their season excited about their momentum heading into the track season and the prospect of a strong XC team in 2026, they too could be in the midst of an impressive winning run. Three teams started a winning streak this past weekend with their third consecutive conference titles: Hunter women’s team, Vassar women’s team, and UMaine Farmington men’s team. They join a prestigious list of 34 other teams with currently sustained conference winning streaks of three or more. North Central men holds the longest current streak in D3 after their 51st consecutive CCIW win over the weekend. MIT men take Calvin’s place as the team with the second longest current winning streak following their 27th consecutive NEWMAC victory. MIT as a program has swept both men’s and women’s NEWMAC titles for 18 consecutive years. Greenville men join the double-digit streaks following their tenth SLIAC victory.
Conference winning streaks after this weekend:
Most of D3 will now reset for track. A select few, however, will forge on and perform a different kind of reset, one that resets conference week emotions and replaces them with regional week focus. The second of the post-season trilogy is perhaps the most important–it carries the momentum it started and lays the foundation for the resolution. Nationals qualifications are on the line. Regionals week is almost here.