The Fordham Men's and Women's Cross Country teams begin their 2015 seasons with the Fordham Fiasco/Ed Joyce Memorial XC Meet at Van Cortlandt Park on Saturday, Sept. 12. The women's 5k will kick things off at 9:45 a.m. before the men's five mile starts at 10:15 a.m.
 
Last year, the men's and women's squads placed second and third, respectively, in their races at the meet among Division I programs.
 
Senior Mike Turi, placing seventh, was the first non-Navy runner to finish, with a time of 26:44.18. The Rams had four others inside the top 25, including juniors Jake Duckworth, Adam Schwenzfeier, Devin Rocks, and Ryan McGann.
 
Graduate student Brianna Tevnan finished runner-up to Rutgers' Paige Senatore last year with a time of 19:40.68, while Mara Lieberman (ninth) and four others finished inside the top 30.
 
Men's cross country enters the season as the 15th-ranked team in the USTFCCCA preseason Northeast Regional poll, while the women's squad seeks to improve on a season that saw them finish in the top three at three meets, including a win at the LIU Post Invitational.
 
The men's program enjoyed a highly successful campaign last year by defending their IC4A University Division Championships, winning two other meets, and garnering seven individual weekly awards, highlighted by senior Quincy O'Connor's USTFCCCA Division I National Athlete of the Week award in October of last year, the only time a Ram has earned that accolade. O'Connor took home the honor for winning the NYC Metropolitan Championship, beating the field by nearly 20 seconds, and helping Fordham win the team title at the event for the first time in 50 years. Turi and then-freshman Thomas Slattery finished runner-up and third, respectively, to O'Connor, with Nik O'Brien placing seventh.
 
At the IC4A's, Turi won the event with a time of 25:46.0, becoming the third Fordham winner in the last four years, joining Jonathan Annelli (2013) and Julian Saad (2011). The men's squad also took home the team title at the LIU Post Invitational.