The Arizona cross-country team is going into its biggest tournament of the year outside of nationals this weekend.

The Wildcats had last week off and have been preparing for the NCAA Pre-National Invitational at 10 a.m. Saturday in Terre Haute, Ind.

This will be the second-largest tournament that the Wildcats will be in this year, but the team is not letting that affect them.

“”No, not really,”” sophomore Jennifer Bergman said when asked if the team is altering its preparation. “”We just increased our training in the last couple weeks because we haven’t had a tournament.””

Junior Hannah Moen echoed Bergman’s thoughts.

“”We actually try and enter into with the same mentality,”” Moen said. “”There is no reason to get worked up about bigger meets. There isn’t really anything different for you to get nervous.””

The women’s team has had a long break with their last tournament being at the Griak Invitational on Sept. 25 and had some added practice time this week to help recover from the layoff.

The coaching staff isn’t worried about the long layoff hurting the team in any way.

“”Chances are it is going to help us I think,”” said head coach James Li. “”I think that we trained pretty well and that we will do well.””

On the men’s side Stephen Sambu suffered a lower leg injury  in practice that will likely prevent him from running this week.

“”We had some setbacks, but we had some advances, too,”” said Li. “”We had some injury issues. Stephen Sambu is probably not going to run this week.””

Expectations will damper for the men without Sambu running who has been their best runner so far this season. The rest of the team has been inconsistent, which Li said will make the weekend an interesting one.

Without Sambu, Li can only wait and see if someone else steps up and makes a splash.