Whenever you consider streaks in sports activities, among the most spectacular which come to thoughts are Cal Ripken Jr.’s 2,632 consecutive MLB video games or U.S. hurdler Edwin Moses’s 122 straight victories within the 400m hurdles. However an NCAA Division II faculty in Grand Rapids, Mich., is quietly constructing a streak of its personal.
Final weekend on the NCAA Division II Midwest Area Championships, Grand Valley State College Lakers received each the lads’s and ladies’s staff titles for the twenty third consecutive season (47 titles in 23 years). This system hasn’t misplaced a staff title on the Midwest Area meet since 2001, a yr when most athletes on at present’s roster weren’t even born.
back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back… or one thing like that#AnchorUp | #ReadyForMore pic.twitter.com/huetXeVRuV
— GVSU XCTF (@GVSUXCTF) November 8, 2025
Grand Valley State’s profitable streak predates the iPhone (2007), Fb (2004) and even the time period ‘podcast” (coined in 2004). Since 2000, the Lakers’ males’s and ladies’s applications have mixed for 9 NCAA D II cross-country nationwide titles. Assume the New England Patriots’ dynasty from 2001 to 2019, then double it, particularly contemplating there are greater than 250 Division II cross-country applications vying to win annually.
What’s the key? It’s exhausting to miss the management driving this system. When Jerry Baltes of Rolling Prairie, Ind., took over in 1999, he by no means let go. He reworked a program with no championship pedigree into probably the most dominant cross-country staff in NCAA D II historical past.
Baltes has received a lot that the NCAA and the U.S. Monitor & Subject and Cross Nation Coaches Affiliation (USTFCCCA) named an award after him, which acknowledges the highest Division II program throughout cross-country, indoor observe, and outside observe.
𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑮𝒐𝒅𝒇𝒂𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓
Head coach, Jerry Baltes heading into his twenty sixth yr of teaching right here at Grand Valley with accolades like no different. 🤯 pic.twitter.com/5llWF7XjFE
— GVSU Lakers (@gvsulakers) August 16, 2023
A number of GVSU athletes have gone on to compete on the U.S. Olympic Trials, and some have represented the U.S. on the world stage, together with marathoner Zach Panning and para-triathlete Chris Hammer.
On Nov. 22, Grand Valley State’s males’s and ladies’s groups will chase nationwide titles nos. 10 and 11 for Baltes on the 2025 NCAA D II Cross Nation Championships in Kenosha, Wisc., with a Canadian twist, led by Waterloo, Ont.’s Brendan Chapple.
