SPARTANBURG, S.C. – The Connecticut College women's cross country team finished 19th in the field of 32 teams at the 2025 NCAA Championship on Saturday morning at the Roger Milliken Cross Country Course.
The Camels notched the best team finish in program history with a score of 471 points.
Grace McDonough (Londonderry, N.H.) finished 13th overall in the individual standings to nab All-America honors for the first time in her cross country career.
NYU captured the team title with a score of 79 points, putting three runners in the top 10 of the individual finishers. Williams (106) and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (133) rounded out the top three of the team standings.
Middlebury's Audrey MacLean finished as individual champion with a time of 20:16.8. She was the only runner in the field to break 21 minutes and finished 48 seconds ahead of runner-up Jules Bleskoski of RPI.
McDonough made the most of the final cross country race of her collegiate career, steadily picking off runners all over the 6K course. Sitting in 137th place at the 1K split, she moved up 43 places before the next checkpoint, and then picked up 60 more spots by the 4K marker. She later claimed 13 positions over the final 1,000 meters of the race and crossed the finish in 21:26.1.
Kiera Tallas (Fountain Valley, Calif.) and
Abby Williams (Waterville, Maine) also had strong races for the Camels. Tallas clocked a time of 22:16.9 and finished 56th overall, while Williams made up 41 places over the final 1K and placed 92nd in 22:45.6.
April Schilling (Amherst, Mass.) and
Abby Fernald (Avon, Conn.) also scored points for the Camels. Schilling was the fourth Conn runner across the line and placed 218th in 23:42.4, while Fernald checked in at 259th with a time of 24:22.8.
Alexa Estes (Virginia Beach, Va.) and
Liz Freeman (Maynard, Mass.) rounded out the group with times of 24:35.7 and 25:36.6, respectively.
McDonough's 13th-place finish was the second-highest in program history. She is also the first Camel to earn All-America honors since 2019, as well as the fourth in program history.
The meet marked the third-straight NCAA appearance for the Camels. McDonough, Williams and Fernald joined a short list of Conn College women's runners who have competed in three NCAA meets.
