Completed Event: Skiing versus 20K Freestyle (M) on March 8, 2025 , , 1st
Final Score
Skiing
1st
vs 20K Freestyle (M)
Wednesday, March 6
Steamboat Springs, CO
9:30 AM
University of Utah
vs
Giant Slalom
Photo by: NCAA Photos via Getty Images
NCAA Championships Send Utah Ski Team to Steamboat Springs
3/4/2024 3:14 PM | Skiing
Utes hope to bring home the program’s fifth straight crown and 17th national championship
| 2024 NCAA Ski Championships | |
| Date // Time (MT) | Wednesday, March 6 // 9:30 a.m. (Giant Slalom) Thursday, March 7 // 10 a.m. (5/10K Freestyle) Friday, March 8 // 6:40 p.m. (Slalom) Saturday, March 9 // 10 a.m. (20K Classic) |
| Location | Steamboat Springs, Colo. Giant Slalom: Steamboat Resort Freestyle, Slalom and Classic: Howelsen Hill Ski Area |
| Live Timing | LiveTiming.com |
| Stream | Available through NCAA.com |
| Utah Championships Media Guide | Click here |
| @UtahSkiTeam Social Media | Twitter // Instagram // Facebook // #GoUtes // #UteNotes |
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo. – It's championship season in the collegiate ski world and this year the Utah Ski Team heads to Steamboat Resort and Howelsen Hill for the 2024 NCAA Championships, hosted by the University of Colorado.
The meet schedule runs Wednesday through Saturday, March 6-9. It all begins on Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. with giant slalom at Steamboat Resort. From there, action will move to Howelsen Hill the rest of the week. The slate includes a 7.5K freestyle interval start on Thursday (men at 10 a.m., women at noon), followed by a night slalom on Friday at 6:40 p.m. On Saturday, the championship meet wraps up with a 20K classic mass start (women at 10 a.m., men at noon).
The Utes have won the last four national championships and 16 all-time; it includes 15 NCAA Championships plus the 1978 AIAW title prior to women's championships coming under the NCAA's umbrella.
Twelve athletes—the maximum a team can qualify—will race for the Utes. The Utah alpine lineup will include Madison Hoffman, Michelle Kervén and Kaja Norbye on the women's side, while the men include Raphael Lessard, Sindre Myklebust and Mikkel Solbakken. For Nordic, the Utes will race Karianne Dengerud, Sydney Palmer-Leger and Nina Schamberger, as well as Brian Bushey, Joe Davies and Tom Mancini on the men's side.
Alongside the Utes, four other programs qualified the full quota of 12 athletes; it includes Colorado, Dartmouth, Denver and Vermont.
The Regular Season Recap
Utah finished third in the RMISA regular season standings, totaling 2,371.5 points across the four meets. It was just 10 points behind Colorado (2,381.5) and was the closest top-three finish since the RMISA first named a regular season champion in 2006. Denver finished second with 2,375 points.
Illustrating just how close the top-three panned out, the 10-point separation among Colorado, Denver and Utah came after the RMISA's top-three regular season teams averaged 579.6 points separation from 2019-23.
Utah won two of the four regular season meets on the RMISA regular season schedule, taking first at its home meet as well as the Westminster Invitational. The team went on to finish third at both the Denver Invitational and Colorado Invitational, before taking second at the RMISA Championships in Montana which doubled as the NCAA West Regional.
Individually, the Utes had conference-bests with 15 individual wins and nine in alpine. The team's 37 podiums also are the most in the RMISA entering this week's national championship meet.
Utes on the World Stage
Though the Utes were shorthanded at times during the regular season RMISA schedule, it was for good reason as members of the team were competing internationally. Six athletes have made at least one World Cup start this season, and in the lineup for NCAAs it includes alpine's Madison Hoffman as well as Nordic's Brian Bushey, Joe Davies and Sydney Palmer-Leger.
Bushey, Davies and Schamberger were among six Utes to spend part of January and February in Europe racing at the U-23 and World Junior Championships for alpine or Nordic.
Most recently on the World Cup circuit, Davies had a 16th-place finish in the Feb. 18 men's 10K freestyle in Minneapolis, finishing just 32.1 seconds behind the winner. Palmer-Leger also clocked a top-25 result in Canmore, Alberta, during the Feb. 9 women's 15K freestyle event.
Utah Well-Represented in 2024 RMISA Postseason Awards
Alpine's Kaja Norbye headlined the RMISA postseason awards for Utah, earning MVP honors in women's slalom. The award is presented annually to the skier who totals the most NCAA qualification points in each discipline and for each gender.
Thirteen All-RMISA awards rolled into Salt Lake City ahead of the NCAA Championships. Eight of the 13 were First Team accolades, with Madison Hoffman, Norbye, Oliver Parazette and Mikkel Solbakken taking home alpine honors. For Nordic, Joe Davies, Karianne Dengerud, Tom Mancini and Sydney Palmer-Leger were named First Team.
Second Team picks went to Sindre Myklebust and Brian Bushey of alpine and Nordic, respectively, while Raphael Lessard, Wilhelm Normannseth and Witta Walcher rounded out the laurels with Honorable Mention.
Nordic Notes
The Utah Nordic lineup for NCAAs will look a little different from recent years, but nevertheless the Utes boast a talented group that has shined on the collegiate stage and beyond. Sydney Palmer-Leger, the native of Park City, Utah, will make her fourth straight trip to the NCAA Championships and look to wrap up her college racing career the same way she started as a freshman: as an individual champion.
A five-time NCAA All-American, Palmer-Leger swept the classic and freestyle races at the 2021 NCAA Championships, beginning a streak of six straight women's Nordic individual champions for the Utes. Novie McCabe and Sophia Laukli split the titles in 2022 before McCabe took them both a year ago in Lake Placid, New York.
Karianne Dengerud and Nina Schamberger will make their first NCAA Championship starts this week, primed with a regular season that saw Dengerud win two of her first three races. The three-time All-RMISA selection brings 23 career starts to the table. Seven of her eight starts this season have netted a top-10 finish. Schamberger has made five starts during her freshman season—it was kicked off by a sixth-place RMISA finish in the 10K classic at the Westminster Invitational. It doubled as a junior win for Schamberger as the race was part of the U.S. National Championships.
Though he may be new to Utah this season, Joe Davies is far from new when it comes to racing at NCAAs. A transfer from Alaska Fairbanks, Davies was the 2023 individual champion in men's 10K freestyle while also turning in a top-six result last year in the 20K classic. He owns three All-America awards after also landing sixth in the 20K freestyle when Utah hosted the NCAA Championships in 2022. This season with the Utes, Davies has two wins and four podiums, including a 7.5K freestyle triumph at the RMISA Championships/NCAA West Regional.
Brian Bushey and Tom Mancini round out the Nordic lineup; each have a win in hand during 2024 and combine for 16 podiums. Bushey's first collegiate podium was also his first win, coming in the 7.5K freestyle on Utah's home snow at Soldier Hollow Nordic Center in January. His first World Cup start came this past February during the Minneapolis series. Mancini had 10 collegiate starts on the year, with his first win coming in the classic sprints during an RMISA qualifier.
All About Alpine
Four of Utah's six alpine competitors have raced at NCAAs at least once, headlined by the return of 2023 women's double alpine champion Madison Hoffman. Hoffman was atop last year's podium in both the giant slalom and slalom competitions, becoming the first Utah female skier to accomplish the feat since Anke Friedrich in 1990.
Hoffman won her collegiate season debut in giant slalom and followed up with silver in the discipline a day later. It came after Hoffman missed Utah's first two meets while on the World Cup circuit.
The Utes also return Michelle Kervén and Kaja Norbye on the women's side, each with two prior starts at nationals. Norbye concluded a stellar freshman campaign in 2022 with two top-six NCAA results; Kervén traveled out to Lake Placid and contributed a top-20 GS result on the way to last year's team title. Norbye has placed in the top-10 in every race this season with three wins, while Kervén has raced in all 12 competitions and has four top-10s.
It'll be the fifth straight NCAA appearance for Westminster transfer Mikkel Solbakken. The 2021 men's giant slalom individual champion also had a seventh-place GS performance in 2022 before placing fourth in slalom last year in Lake Placid. Solbakken's first year with the Utes saw him earn All-RMISA First Team.
Newcomers on this stage, Raphael Lessard and Sindre Myklebust will look to help the Utes to their fifth straight national championship. Lessard, named All-RMISA Honorable Mention, has five top-10 finishes this year and four top-10s as a freshman in 2022. Myklebust has started all 12 races in his first season as a Ute, with six finishes in the top-10.
Utah and Steamboat
The 2024 NCAA Championships will mark the seventh time in recorded program history that Utah has competed here in search for the national crown. The Utes raised the national championship trophy in 1993 and were third in 2016. In addition, the '79 men's team finished second; the NCAA held only a men's team championship in skiing until 1983 when genders were combined.
Follow the Utah Ski Team
Follow the Utah Ski Team on social media @utahskiteam.
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