While the best high school runners in the country raced in Portland, Oregon, at the cross-country national championship, then-high school senior Colin Bennie watched freshmen take slap shots in Wachusett, Massachusetts. Bennie, a hockey captain for Wachusett Regional (Massachusetts) High School, qualified for the race in Portland, but opted to skip it for tryouts for the second-straight year.

“It doesn’t matter what sport it is,” Bennie’s brother Jeremy said. “From day one it’s always been about the team.”

Few knew Bennie skipped nationals, said Wachusett hockey coach Matt Lane, but that’s the way Bennie works. He did what he felt needed to be done for the team, not himself.

From his days playing hockey to becoming a two-time cross-country All-American at Syracuse, Bennie has put his team before himself. On Nov. 18, he’ll do the same as the Orange aims to capture its second national championship in three years. For Bennie, who has been Syracuse’s second-best runner since his sophomore season, Saturday’s race is an opportunity to show how important he is to the Orange.

Much of that selflessness comes from his beginnings in sports and mirroring his brothers, Graham and Jeremy. When Bennie started high school, all three ran cross country and played hockey together. He is the youngest of the three, but was determined to keep up with his brothers.

Bennie challenged himself to be just as fast as his brothers, so every day he put in extra work, Graham said. Age didn’t make a difference in Bennie’s mind. He just wanted to be right alongside Graham and Jeremy when the race finished.

“He wasn’t overtaken by the need to be the number one,” Wachusett cross-country head coach Brian Wallace said.

As high school sped by, it became apparent that Bennie was a special talent. In fall 2011, his junior year, Bennie qualified for nationals after a “surprising” performance at regionals, but he never planned on making it to Oregon. So, as an assistant captain, he opted for hockey tryouts.

A year later, Bennie had asserted himself as one of the top talents in the northeast and even in the country. The senior easily qualified for nationals, but again passed on the opportunity.

“He could make a personal decision,” Graham said, “and go out there and run another cross-country race to bolster his running career. Or he could make a leadership decision, be selfless, and go to hockey tryouts, and set the stage for the young guys coming in.”

When hockey ended and outdoor track began, Bennie recommitted himself to running.

In 30 years of coaching, Wallace never had a 4×800-meter relay team that ran below eight minutes, he said. Six or seven times, he said, his teams finished between 8:00 and 8:02. It was up to Bennie to break the eight-minute barrier.

At the Massachusetts state meet in spring 2011, Wachusett’s 4×800 team, led by Bennie, clocked a 7:53 to win the event. After three decades, Wallace finally saw his relay team finish under eight minutes. But Bennie wasn’t finished.

One week after breaking eight minutes, Wachusett ran a 7:48 to qualify for nationals. Two weeks later at nationals, the team ran a 7:36, setting the new Massachusetts state record which still stands today.

Bennie ran wherever he was needed. Sometimes he anchored to close the race while other times he would run the second or third leg to bust the race open, his mother, Lisa, said.

“The kind of person he is,” Wallace said, “just having the ability to rally his teammates to get better each week … He’s got such a will to get his job done as a teammate.”

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Bennie showcased those qualities when he arrived at Syracuse in fall 2013. Upon arriving to Syracuse, the gold standard on its roster was Martin Hehir. At the time, he was the fastest Syracuse runner in modern team history and did everything the right way, Bennie said.

During his redshirt- and true-freshman years, Bennie looked at Hehir like he did his brothers, observing what Hehir did and applying it to become a stronger runner. Quickly, Bennie got faster, but so did then-sophomore Justyn Knight, who became SU’s top runner that year, ahead of Hehir. Knight wasn’t the only runner to eclipse Hehir. From 2014 to 2015, the gap between Hehir and Bennie essentially vanished.

Before the Coast-to-Coast Battle in Beantown at the end of September in 2015, SU assistant coach Adam Smith remembered talking to head coach Chris Fox about Bennie possibly beating Hehir.

“Fox kind of looked at me like, ‘I don’t think so, dude,’” Smith said.

Both runners finished the race in 23:55.0 and Hehir was given third place. Bennie officially finished fourth.

“That was the first time we thought Colin might be for real,” Smith said.

Five weeks later, Bennie beat Hehir at the Atlantic Coast Conference championship before finishing one spot ahead of Hehir when Syracuse won the NCAA championship on Nov. 21, 2015.

The 2015 season solidified Bennie’s position as one of Syracuse’s top runners and showed the importance of his consistency. That year, Bennie finished in the top 10 in every event he raced in. Heading into NCAAs, the coaching staff wanted him to aim for the low 20s, Smith said. Bennie finished eighth.

Having bested his brothers and Hehir, Bennie needed someone new to chase. Knight became that someone.

In the two years since SU’s national title, Bennie has never beaten Knight, but the two have become one of the country’s top pairs.

“It’s always looking toward that person in front of him to chase down,” Graham said. “I think that’s what has helped him to be so consistent during his Syracuse career.”

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However, Bennie isn’t just chasing anymore. With younger runners looking to him as the model that Hehir was years ago, Bennie is now being chased. While Bennie is now a leader for Syracuse, he’s less vocal than other seniors on the team like Knight and Philo Germano.

“His words carry a lot of weight,” Fox said, “because he doesn’t waste them.”

Last week, Syracuse ran its championship workout on Sweet Road in Manlius. The six-mile course tests runners to their limits. Some runners on the team had an “A” day, Smith said. Bennie didn’t. He didn’t have an awful day, but didn’t have a great day. It was a solid “B-plus,” Smith said.

But Bennie was the first person applauding the rest of his teammates that day, telling those who had great workouts to keep it up and helping to coach runners who had off days like he did. Even on a “B-plus” day, Bennie is as consistent as it comes for SU.

“There are no days off,” Bennie said. “Rings are fun.”

Bennie has been Syracuse’s No. 2 for the better part of three years and hasn’t missed a beat. Many opponents know of Knight because of his talent, but also his flare. Bennie and Knight are complementary, like “Yin and Yang,” Lisa said. Knight draws the attention, while Bennie flies under the radar.

But that’s how Bennie would rather have it be. When runners are nervous before a big race, Bennie is the one that calms everyone’s nerves, Hehir said. And when the race comes to an end, he’s always in front of those who forgot about him.

“We call him the ‘silent assassin,’” Smith said. “He’s got a mission and he’s going to do whatever it takes to get there.”

Published on November 15, 2017 at 10:33 pm

Contact Matt: mdliberm@syr.edu