Sooners Head To Big 12 Cross Country Meet

Oct. 31, 2002

NORMAN, Okla. - The University of Oklahoma men's and women's cross country teams are headed to Columbia, Mo., for the seventh annual Big 12 Cross Country Championships. The races will be held at A.J. Gustin Jr. Golf Course on the Missouri campus. The women's 6k race will begin at 10 a.m. Saturday and will be followed by the men's 8k race at 11 a.m.

Looking at the Competition
Colorado is the defending champion in both events. The CU men, currently ranked third in the country, have won every conference cross country title since the Big 12 began competition in 1996. The Buffaloes also are the defending NCAA cross country champions.
The CU women have won five of the six Big 12 team titles and have won the last three consecutive. Kansas State is the only other league team to win a cross country title -- the Wildcats won in 1998. Two Big 12 women's teams are currently ranked -- Colorado is third and host Missouri is 11th.
Runners must finish in the top nine to earn all-conference honors.

Competing for the Sooners
Making the trip to Columbia for the men are Jimmy Buchanan, John Mulholland, Joey McNair, Billy Grona, Jason Brown, Andrew Call, and Darren Hutchins. Competing for the Sooner women are Alaina Dearman, Jackie Dubois, Sara Justice, Amanda Luksetich, Aisha Stringer and Kim Thomas.
This will be the first time for Call, Mulholland, Grona and Justice to run in the conference cross country championship. All the other OU entries have competed in previous Big 12 meets.Their past performances are highlighted later in this release. Mulholland and Grona are freshmen. Justice has competed in cross country in two previous seasons but has never run in the Big 12 meet. Call competed in five of seven meets last year as a freshman but did not run in the Big 12 Championship.

The Coach
Rodney Rothoff joined the Sooner coaching staff in August after two seasons as the head cross country and assistant track coach for the Tennessee women's program. In his tenure in Knoxville, Rothoff coached 11 NCAA cross country and track All-Americans. He coached the 2002 SEC champion in the outdoor 800 and had four All-SEC cross country selections. His 2001 cross country team was the SEC runner-up.
A 1990 graduate of Methodist College in North Carolina, Rothoff has also coached Clemson and Arkansas-Little Rock.

The Last Time Out
Junior Joey McNair led the Sooner cross country team to a 12th-place finish at the Arkansas Chile Pepper Invitational on Oct. 19 at the Arkansas Cross Country course at Agri Park.
McNair finished the 10K race with a 31:02.33, a career best for the Sooner from Bartlesville. All seven Sooner runners posted career bests in the race. Junior Darren Hutchins of Choctaw lowered his career best in the 10K by more than two minutes and three Sooner runners posted better times than OU's best time in the meet last year.
The OU women last competed at OSU on Oct. 5.

The Coach Says
On the meet:
"I am truly looking forward to this meet. On the women's side, our athletes' self confidence has shown a dramatic improvement since we started training. Their fitness level has also shown significant improvement. This meet will have been a successful one for us if they improve their finishes over the last time out and the last time they ran in a Big 12 meet. For our men, the training has progressed better than I expected and they seem to be coming around physically at the right time. For this to be a successful meet for us, we must close the gap between our fourth and fifth runners. The ability to do that will have a huge impact on our overall team finish. I also want to see each of our runners show continued improvement -- over previous meets this year and over past conference races."
On the course:
"It will be a very challenging course. It features a lot of rolling hills. Knowing that, we built our schedule this year to give us the opportunity to compete on similar courses. It will be like a lot of the courses we have already run but none of those was a conference meet. Everything is emphasized at this point of the season."
More on the Sooner men:
"Joey McNair has the potential to move into the top 15. I am really looking forward to seeing how he handles this meet. His mental approach has caught up with his physical development and it will be interesting to see how he competes with his new level of fitness. Jimmy Buchanan has really responded in the last two weeks. He is capable of doing more than he has shown so far and he is beginning to believe that. He is starting to challenge in practice and be more competitive. If he continues to do that, he will begin to run to his talent level. I couldn't be prouder of Darren Hutchins and what he has done this season. He has made a huge improvement and he is beginning to show what he can do. He has made huge improvements in his approach to running in terms of the mechanical and as a result, he is running more efficiently technically than he ever has. He has done everything I have asked of him and beyond. I think it will show this weekend in his performance."
More on the Sooner women:
"I want to see Aisha Stringer have the best meet of her career. You want to see seniors go out in their final conference appearance with something special to remember and Aisha is due that. Amanda Luksetich has done so much hard work this season and I'd love to see it pay off for her at the Big 12. She is ready for a good performance at the Big 12."

OU Team Meet History
The Sooners have fielded a team in each of the previous six conference meets and hosted the meet last year.
The Sooner women's all-time best team finish was ninth and OU has done that twice. The first time came in 1997 and then the Sooners repeated that performance in 1998. It was in the 1998 race that the OU women recorded their all-time best individual finish with Mindy Mizell's 13th place finish.
The Sooner men's all-time team best team finish has been 10th. That has happened twice in conference meet history -- in 1998 and 2001. The Sooner men have produced one cross country all-conference selection. In 1996, the inaugural year of the meet, Craig Kirkwood finished third to earn the honor.

Current Sooners' Past Performance
For Sooner senior Aisha Stringer, this will be her fourth Big 12 meet. As a freshman, she finished 90th with a time of 20:14 in the 5k in 1999. In 2000, the women began running a 6k and Stringer finished 74th with a 24:27. In 2001, she finished 66th with a time of 23:18.5.
On the men's side, Jason Brown will be competing in his fourth Big 12 meet. In 1999, he finished 93rd in the 8k with a time of 29:14. In 2000, he was 78th with a time of 28:18. In 2001, he was again 78th with a time of 27:20.0.
Past results for other Sooners who are competing this weekend include:
Jimmy Buchanan, 2001, 41st with a time of 25:23.6
Joey McNair, 2000, 76th with a time of 28:16; 2001, 49th with a time of 25:34.1
Darren Hutchins, 2000, 79th with a time of 28:20; 2001, 78th with a time of 27:20.0
Alaina Dearman, 2000, 73rd with a time of 24:20; 2001, 68th with a time of 23:48.0 (She is a senior as well but did not compete in cross country her first two seasons as a Sooner.)
Amanda Luksetich, 2000, 78th with a time of 24:47; 71st with a time of 24:04.6
Jackie Dubois, 2001, 79th with a time of 25:20.6
Kim Thomas, 2001, 81st with a time of 25:47.0

Next Up
The Sooners will return to competition on Nov. 16 when they travel to the NCAA Midwest Regional in Normal, Ill. The NCAA Championship is scheduled for Nov. 25 at Indiana State University. That field will be determined by performances in the regional meets.

2002 Sooner Meet Results
54th Annual John "JK" Kornelson Gold Classic
OU Men (second out of seven teams - 4 mile)
2. Joey McNair, 20:46.16
7. Jimmy Buchanan, 21:23.85
8. Darren Hutchins, 21:28.42
20. John Mulholland, 22:43.42
23. Jason Brown, 22:57.67
26. Billy Grona, 23:09.88
27. Andrew Call, 23:12.07
28. Trevor Gillum, 23:16.60
37. Kevin Howarth, 24:20.50
OU Women (fourth out of five teams - 3.1 mile)
16. Amanda Luksetich, Amanda, 20:45.33
22. Kim Thomas, 21:51.43
23. Julie Miller, 22:08.52
24. Alaina Dearman, 22:13.43
26. Jackie Dubois, 22:51.25
28. Sara Justice, 23:06.26
29. Emily Leonard, 23:25.36
40. Tiffany Johnson, 24:59.59

SMU Invitational
OU Men (second out of 4 teams - 8k)
2. Joey McNair, 25:07 (#)
4. Jimmy Buchanan, 25:53
9. Darren Hutchins, 26:56 (#)
15. John Mulholland, 27:19 (#)
16. Andrew Call, 27:20 (#)
19. Jason Brown, 27:55
25. Billy Grona, 28:39
OU Women (third out of four teams - 5k)
15. Aisha Stringer, 20:27
17. Jackie Dubois, 20:48 (#)
18. Amanda Luksetich, 20:50
20. Sara Justice, 21:49 (#)
21. Emily Leonard, 21:58 (#)

Cowboy Jamboree
OU Men (11th out of 21 teams - 8k)
20. Joey McNair, 25:06 (#)
44. Jimmy Buchanan, 25:44
52. Darren Hutchins, 25:50 (#)
95. John Mulholland, 26:56 (#)
106. Jason Brown, 27:13 (#)
109. Andrew Call, 27:18
135. Billy Grona, 28:52
193. Spencer Hunt, 29:21
OU Women (16th out of 17 teams - 5k)
63. Nicola Maye, 19:42 (#)
81. Kim Thomas, 20:11
87. Amanda Luksetich, 20:20
90. Alaina Dearman, 20:21 (#)
103. Sara Justice, 21:27 (#)
106. Jackie Dubois, 21:43
110. Emily Leonard, 22:27
141. Tiffany Johnson, 23:09

Arkansas Chile Pepper
OU Men (12th out of 26 - 10k)
37. Joey McNair, 31:02.33 (#)
50. Jimmy Buchanan, 31:38.87 (#)
51. Darren Hutchins, 31:40.33 (#)
93. John Mulholland, 33:01.52 (#)
106. Jason Brown, 33:21.44 (#)
127. Andrew Call, 34:10.39 (#)
133. Grona, Billy, 34:24.50 (#)
(#) Established a career best at that distance

University of Oklahoma Athletics

Sooners Head To Big 12 Cross Country Meet

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