For the second time in three weeks, the Penn State women's cross country team will be heading to Indiana for a meet.

Only this time, it will be in Bloomington for the Big Ten Championship tomorrow.

The meet will be the most challenging yet for the youthful Nittany Lions. But the bye week has given the team an extra week to practice.

"We came off the Pre-Nationals, and then we recovered," head coach Beth Alford-Sullivan said. "We used the week for preparation. We are doing extremely well and feel pretty healthy."

For Penn State to compete well, the runners will have to be at their best. There is little to no room for error when it comes to conference races.

And the Big Ten is no ordinary conference. The Big Ten may just be the toughest in the country. There are currently six conference rivals in the official cross country rankings.

Four schools are in the top 10: Michigan at No. 3., No. 5 Wisconsin, No. 6 Minnesota, and No. 9 Illinois rounds out the remaining top-10 teams.

These high-caliber opponents will make it extremely difficult for Penn State to come out in first this weekend. Instead, the coaches are focusing more on the efforts of the players.

"We try to have the athletes focused on having their best performance--do the best they can. That's all we can ask for," assistant coach John Gondak said.

And if the Lions can put together a great all-around effort, they could pull off some shockers and finish ahead of some ranked teams.

"As a team, we want to surprise the other teams in the Big Ten. We want to put in a team effort," sophomore Meghan Noecker said. "We just want to have the best performance of the season."

As much as the team wants to perform beyond expectations, it will be one of the least experienced teams at the meet. Those competing for the Lions will primarily be freshmen and sophomores. Only nine runners can be taken for each team at the Big Ten Championship. All but one will be either a freshman or sophomore. And that "one" is only a junior. So to say the team is just a bit young and inexperienced is a gross understatement.

The youthfulness will surely pay dividends down the road. This season, Penn State has already had three second-place finishes. At this rate, it's anyone's guess how far this team will go in the future. But even this year, the team improved mightily--gaining more big game experience every weekend.

"You learn that there is always a surprise team at the Big Ten championships. Anything can happen," Alford-Sullivan said.