Canyons Cross Country Prepares for State Championship Meet
The Cougars head to the state championship meet as the No. 9 ranked team in the state, while freshman Danielle Salcedo looks to remain undefeated in community college competition.
By Jesse Muñoz/COC Sports Information Director
College of the Canyons women's cross country and freshman runner Danielle Salcedo will be chasing history on Saturday, with the Cougars taking the course as Woodward Park in Fresno with a chance to make program history.
Canyons has never won a CCCAA women's cross country state championship. The program's best finish came in 2014 with the women's squad finishing runner-up.
The Cougars enter the state championship meet as the No. 9 ranked team in the state and the No. 7 team in Southern California. That ranking comes after COC placed seventh at the CCCAA SoCal Regional Championships on Nov. 5.
COC's women's team is competing at the state championships for the seventh time in program history (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2021).
History could be in the making for Salcedo, who arrives at the state championship meet still undefeated in community college competition. Salcedo ran to an individual CCCAA SoCal Regional Championship with a time of 17:55.01.
In doing so she became the first individual regional champion in women's cross country program history.
Salcedo is also the individual Western State Conference (WSC) Champion.
At the state meet, Salcedo should see strong individual competition from Stina Johansson of Ventura College and Yahaira Zuniga of San Diego Mesa, as well as Sofia Camacho and Valeria Lozano-Gomez from Clovis College.
Former Cougar runner Díani Ellis holds the program record with her 2017 run at Woodward Park at the state championships. Ellis' time of 18:32.1 on the 5K course placed her fifth overall and earned JC All-American honors.
Action will get underway at 10 a.m. on Saturday, Nov. 20 at Woodward Park in Fresno with the women's 5K race. The men's four-mile event will begin at 11 a.m. Saturday's forecast calls for partly cloudy skies with early morning temperatures in the mid-40s, a high of 65 and little wind, if any.
Stay up to date on all this season's action by following the College of the Canyons Athletic department on social media at @COCathletics on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.
—Photo by Mari Kneisel/COC Sports Information