STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Wagner's men's and women's cross country programs are set for their 2025 campaign, which will begin at Stevens Institute of Technology's Back to the Bowl meet.
Held at Holmdel Park, this meet will be the first of a slate of five meets, which will conclude on Saturday, November 1 with the Northeast Conference Championships. The 2025 season marks the program's first under new head coach Marvin Azor, who took over the program in July after the departure of longtime head coach Joe Stasi.
The men's team comes off a second-place finish at the 2024 NEC Championship, picked second by the conference's coaches coming into this season. Of 11 runners on the roster, nine will be returning from last year's group.
At last season's NEC Championship, senior Justin Morris led the team finishing in seventh place, with rookie Keegan Baluja finishing fourteenth as the second freshman to finish. Both were named to the All-NEC team at the conclusion of the meet. The men's team most recently won the NEC Championship in 2022 at the same B & D Acres course that will host the meet in 2025, with Jean Uminski also taking home the individual title for the Seahawks.
On the women's side, the Seahawks finished third at last season's NEC Championship and were also picked in the 2025 preseason poll. The team returns 10 runners of their 15 on the roster.
Senior Laura Trenado and junior Rylee Ferretti led Wagner in last season's third-place finish at the conference championship, with Trenado finishing fifth and Ferretti following in sixth to also earn All-NEC honors. A majority of this team has recently tasted major success as a part of Wagner's women's track and field teams that won both the NEC Indoor and Outdoor Championships last season, the program's first titles in each of those categories.
Wagner's last NEC Championship for the women came in 1993, the program's second-ever championship after the Seahawks went back-to-back after winning their first title in 1992.
The season begins on Saturday, September 6 at Back to the Bowl, held by the Stevens Institute of Technology.
