St. Lawrence University sophomore Megan Kellogg will be among the runners to watch as St. Lawrence University's women's cross country team makes its eighth straight appearance in the NCAA Division III Cross Country Championships hosted by the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh on Saturday.

Kellogg has had a perfect season thus far…seven starts and seven wins…but will face her toughest competition of the year in the national finals. Named the NCAA Atlantic Region Runner of the Year this year and a All America a year ago when she finished 11th, she ran her best time of the year on the Lake Breeze Golf Club course in Winneconne, WI.

She ran 21:11.70 on the same course which will be run Saturday to win the UW-Oshkosh AAE Invitational in early October. Kellogg ran under 22 minutes in all five of her six kilometer races this season.

"Megan has enjoyed an unbelievable year and I couldn't be happier to see her honored with the regional athlete of the year award," said Saint coach Mike Howard. "She has worked incredibly hard and is as focused and determined as any athlete I've ever had the opportunity to coach. In a race of this caliber there's always a small field of front runners who can all make a run for the individual title and I have no doubt that she'll be right in the forefront of that group."

She will be joined on the Saint team by junior Lisa Grohn, a returning All America from last season when she finished 26th, sophomore Ashley Leta, making her second straight NCAA appearance and a contingent of first-years: Elina and Anna Breton, Gaelyn Bronson, Caroline Driscoll and alternate Sarah Moon.

The Saints will be making their eighth straight appearance as a team and have had four straight top ten finishes including third a year ago. They may be hard-pressed to duplicate that accomplishment as they will be one of the youngest teams in the field with no seniors and four rookies running in their first NCAA race.

"Despite the loss of two All Americans from last year and being a very young team, I continue to believe that this team's best race is yet to come," said Howard. "Obviously having two front runners the caliber of Megan and Lisa is huge in a race like this and if we can continue to see improvement from our next wave which is led by Ashley Leta, we believe a top 10 team finish is very possible."

St. Lawrence has run in nine NCAA championship races since introducing cross country as a varsity sport in 1992. The Saint men and women's cross country programs have been among the most successful teams for SLU in the 2000's and the men are also making their eighth straight team appearance since 2008.