Members of the Eastern Oregon men’s cross country team take off on a warm-up run Thursday morning. (Ronald Bond, The Observer)

Michelle Herbes got a taste of what the NAIA national championship cross country meet is like last fall.

This year, the Eastern Oregon University sophomore is hoping to take her teammates along, and there is an anticipation that the Mountaineers will be in the mix to field a full women’s team to nationals this season.

“Everyone’s been doing really good on their training,” Herbes said. “Our workouts the past few weeks have been really good. We’ve been working really well together as a team. Even though we’re really young, there is a lot of talent that came in, (and) a lot of the returners have talent and room to grow.”

Herbes, who qualified for nationals last year as an individual, said the national meet was an “amazing experience,” and believes the still-young EOU squad — which returned all seven first-year runners from last year and has even more freshmen — has the talent to get there.

“It’s something we can achieve as a team as long as we work hard throughout the season and trust ourselves and our training,” she said.

EOU head coach Ben Welch said he is really excited about the potential the EOU women have this season.

“That is a very good group,” he said. “We had that huge freshman class last year and all seven of them are back. (I’m) quite excited about that. A few of them had some setbacks (in the offseason), but for the most part they look good and they’re training well.”

Part of what has Welch’s hopes high is how the team performed in its preseason time trial.

“That was one of the best time trials we’ve had in a long time on the ladies side,” he said, adding it was the top effort in the time trial since 2010 and noting that both Herbes and Megan Boals had top-10 all-time finishes in it. “We get a lot of good indicators out of it.”

Herbes, Katie Jo Gebhardt, Boals, Alexa Jones, Calista Van Delden, Kendra Blake and Molly Gulden are all returners who competed at the Cascade Collegiate Conference meet last fall to help EOU take sixth. Eastern could also get a boost from first-year runner Ella Coughlan, a freshman from Joseph.

“Some people might be surprised with how fast she is,” Welch said of Coughlan. “She could be one of our diamonds in the rough that puts us over the top.”

The men’s team is also going through a youth movement as the Mountaineers will have just two seniors running this fall in Alex Navarro and Weyekin Wild Bill. The Mountaineers return the bulk of their team from last fall, including Hunter Schiess, Travis Running and Robie Swanson, all of whom ran on the team that placed 19th at nationals. Braxton Wilson and Brennen LeBel are also among the returners.

“Personally, I’m hyped,” Schiess, a junior, said. “A lot of people did their summer training. We definitely have a younger team, but they’re fit. They were studs in high school, so I think they will fit in well over here.”

Eastern gets an experienced runner back in Navarro, who redshirted last fall but has two national meets under his belt, including being EOU’s No. 2 runner when the team placed seventh two years ago.

“He looks very, very good,” Welch said of Navarro. “We look to him to lead that group.”

Like Herbes on the women’s side, the EOU men who competed at nationals gained a lot of experience from the trip.

“Hunter Schiess actually ran well at nationals,” Welch said. “Travis Running as a freshman last year was surprised he was at nationals, and on a course that ran slow ran his best race of the year.”

Schiess described the men’s team as grinders and runners who will put in hard work.

“That’s just how we’ve always been. It takes us a while to figure out our style of running, especially moving up to the 8K. A lot of us come from 5K (in HS),” he said. “We’ll see how the young guys pick up. They’ve been grinding with us in the workouts. They’re doing well.”

The Mountaineers’ top newcomer to the program may be freshman Hunter Nichols of Heppner, who Welch speaks highly of.

“He’s smart, he gets a lot of things, and he’s patient,” Welch said.

The longtime coach is hopeful that the men’s team can again be in the top 20 nationally should it make the national meet, and his optimistic about the women’s chances of breaking into the top 25 at nationals for the first time since taking 13th in 2012.

The Mountaineers’ home meet is today, at Lane Farms east of La Grande at 5:45 p.m.

The CCC championships are Nov. 8 in Cottage Grove.