The UW women’s cross-country program lost its first race of the year yesterday. Unfortunately, it was the only one that mattered.

The women were upended in their title defense by Villanova University and Florida State University, coming in a disappointing third-place at the NCAA championship, despite being ranked No. 1 for the entire year. The men had a similarly lackluster performance, managing only an 18th-place team finish. While there were some bright spots Monday, most notably sophomore Kendra Schaaf’s challenge for the individual title, assistant coach Jason Drake summarized the mood via Twitter: “tough day for dawgs.”

“We came here to win,” head coach Greg Metcalf said. “We came here to win and defend a national championship.”

It would be easy to focus on the positives, on the podium finish for the women’s team, and the sprint finish that almost led to Schaaf winning a national title. But they hold themselves up to the highest standards of excellence, and third place is not enough. Fortunately for them, the team is young and will lose only Katie Follett to graduation. Losing this year may serve as motivation for next year.

For now, though, it’s hard.

“Villanova was the best on this day,” Follett said. “Maybe if we raced on a different day, it would have turned out differently. But today we were the third-place team in the nation, and we’re trying to focus on the fact that it was just a day.”

Follett was quick to administer praise to her teammates, calling them “superstars,” but not without a tinge of remorse for what could have been.

The women were led by Schaaf’s steady performance, and for a moment it looked like the Husky phenom would win the individual title. Jenny Barringer and Susan Kuijken, the individual favorites heading into the meet, were running neck and neck for much of the race. Abruptly, Barringer’s form collapsed, and she dropped off the pace. Shortly after that, she stuttered to a complete stop and collapsed for a few seconds before up-righting and finishing the race.

Kuijken was left alone, ahead of a pack that included Schaaf and Angela Bizzarri. Bizzarri and Schaaf began to catch Kuijken on the last straightaway, and from there on, it was a duel between Schaaf and Bizzarri for the title. For a second, it looked like Schaaf was going to pass Bizzarri, but Schaaf couldn’t get around the senior from Illinois, settling instead for a second-place finish.

Follett was the next finisher for UW, in 21st place. Last year’s championship team featured four women in the top 20. Mel Lawrence and Christine Babcock were close behind Follett, in 27th and 29th, but the Huskies had a huge drop off from fourth to fifth place. Freshman Allison Linnell was the last scorer for UW, in 109th place. The gap from Schaaf to Linnell was 103 seconds. Compare that to the Huskies spread last year, of 35 seconds, and you can understand exactly how the Huskies walked away unhappy.

The men suffered a similar fate. Their front three runners, Kelly Spady, Colton Tully-Doyle and Jake Schmitt, had all planned on running together and garnering All-American status by finishing in the top 40. Spady, who was the top Husky, was 55th. Tully-Doyle followed in 60th, and Schmitt was 81st. Cameron Quackenbush and an ailing Max O’Donoghue-McDonald rounded out the Huskies, scoring five with 126th and 140th place finishes. The men finished in 18th, well short of their top-10 goal. Their spread of 66 seconds is made all the worse when one considers that Spady was 18 seconds off his goal of a top-40 finish.

“We asked a lot out of the young guys,” Tully-Doyle said. “They gave it everything they could.”

Tully-Doyle was optimistic about the future of the program, citing James Cameron, Quackenbush and Rob Webster Jr. as examples of the next generation of leaders. As for yesterday’s race, Tully-Doyle paused before saying, “Maybe it just wasn’t our day. It wasn’t our day.”

Reach reporter Zachary Gussin at sports@dailyuw.com.