Sooner CC Heads To NCAA Regional Meet

NORMAN -- The University of Oklahoma men's and women's cross country teams will leave Friday afternoon and head north to Stillwater for the NCAA Midwest Regional Championship. The meet is scheduled for Saturday and is hosted by Oklahoma State University. The men's 10k race is scheduled for 11 a.m. with the women's 6k race set for noon.

The Field

The Midwest Region field includes teams and/or individuals from 31 schools including Bradley, Chicago State, Creighton, DePaul, Drake, Eastern Illinois, Illinois State, Illinois, Illinois-Chicago, Iowa, Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas State, Loyola - Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, Missouri-Kansas City, Nebraska, Northern Illinois (women only), Northern Iowa, Northwestern (women only), Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Oral Roberts, Saint Louis, Southern Illinois- Carbondale, Southeast Missouri State, Southwest Missouri State, Tulsa, Western Illinois and Wichita State.
The Midwest Regional is one of nine regional meets set for Saturday. A total of 304 schools participate in cross country at the Division I men's level while 320 schools have cross country teams for women at the Division I level.

What's At Stake

The top two teams from each regional qualify for the NCAA Championships set for Monday, Nov. 24, in Waterloo, Iowa. An additional 13 at-large teams will be invited to the meet. In addition, the top four individuals from the regional meets not on a qualifying team will qualify for the NCAA meet and an additional two at-large individuals will be invited. All individual qualifiers must finish in the top 25 at the regional meet.

Competing for the Sooners

Scheduled to compete for the OU men in Stillwater are seniors Jimmy Buchanan, Darren Hutchins, Silverus Kimeli and Joe McNair, sophomore Blake Culp and freshmen Jason Coleman and Tyler Schmiedeberg. The OU women will be represented by senior Amanda Luksetich, and freshmen Andrea Bonner, Jessica Eldridge, Nicola Maye and Catherine Odell.

Sooners Ranked In Regional Polls

Heading into the regional meet, both Sooner teams are ranked in the latest regional polls.
The Sooner men are ranked fourth in the region following the Big 12 Championship. OU was ranked 10th in the preseason poll and jumped to seventh on Sept. 22. OU improved to third on Oct. 6 and stayed there for three polls. The men's poll is sponsored by MONDO and is conducted by the United States Cross Country Coaches Association.
The Sooner women are ranked eighth in the region heading into this weekend. OU was unranked in the preseason poll then debuted in the poll at fifth on Sept. 21. The Sooners went to seventh on Sept. 28, moved to sixth on Oct. 5 and stayed there for two more polls. Finish/Lynx sponsors the women's poll and the voting is conducted by the Women's Intercollegiate Cross Country Coaches Association.
In the latest national poll, Oklahoma State (23rd) and Iowa (30th) are the only Midwest men's teams ranked while Missouri (20th) is the only Midwest women's team that is ranked. Both polls were released Nov. 4 after conference championships were held.

The Rest of the Big 12 ...

Colorado will compete in the Mountain Regional while Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, and Baylor are entered in the South Central meet. The Mountain Regional is being hosted by Weber State and the South Central meet is being hosted by Baylor.

A Year Ago at the Regionals for the Sooners

Junior Jimmy Buchanan led seven Sooners runners who posted career best marks at the 2002 NCAA Midwest Regional Championships on the Illinois State Golf Course. Buchanan ran the 10k course in 31:06.76 to finish 43rd. The time was 32 seconds faster than his previous career mark on a 10k course.
His finish, combined with top 50 finishes by Joe McNair and Darren Hutchins, helped the Sooners finish 13th in the team standings, OU's best performance in regional competition in six years. The Sooner women were 23rd in the team standings.
McNair, after battling flu the week of the meet, finished 46th with a time of 31:09.53. Hutchins recorded a career best of 31:12.53 and finished 49th overall. For Hutchins, the top 50 finish was a huge improvement. In his previous regional performances, Hutchins had finished 110th as a sophomore and 142nd as a freshman.
John Mulholland, with a 32:12.30, and Jason Brown, with a 32:42.36, also recorded career best marks for the Sooner men.
Senior Aisha Stringer led the Sooner women for the second time. She finished the 6k course with a career best mark of 22:57.21. Amanda Luksetich was the second best runner for the Sooners, finishing with a career best mark of 23:35.85. Emily Leonard also posted a career best as a Sooner, covering the course in 25:54.00.

The Last Time Out

Paced by a pair of top 15 finishes, the University of Oklahoma men's cross country team finished seventh at the 2003 Big 12 Championship at Barton Creek Lakeside Country Club on Oct. 31. The finish is the highest for the Sooner men in the eight years of the Big 12 Conference.
Silverus Kimeli finished seventh with a 24:56.8 in the 8k race to lead the Sooners. Senior Joe McNair finished 13th in the race with a 25:08.1. The finish by McNair was an all-time career best in conference competition.
The Sooner women, paced by Jessica Eldridge, finished ninth in the team standings which tied for the all-time best league finish for OU. Eldridge was 10th in the 6k race with a 22:05.9, the best ever individual finish for a Sooner woman.
The Sooner men finished with 154 points, just 19 behind fourth place Kansas. The spread from third to seventh in the men's standings was 35 points. The Sooner women finished with 211 points. The men's point total was the lowest in the eight years of the meet and marked the first time in Big 12 competition for OU to score less than 200 points in the team competition. The women's total was the second lowest in the eight years of the league.
Darren Hutchins finished 41st with a 26:15.9 followed by Jimmy Buchanan who was 44th with a 26:29.7. The final runner to score for the Sooners was Jason Coleman who finished 49th with a 26:35.5. Other Sooner competitors included Salah Hussein, who covered the course in 27:07.0; Blake Culp, who finished with a 27:15.7; Andrew Call, who posted a 27:34.6; and Tyler Schmiedeberg, who ran a 28:06.0.
Nicola Maye finished 28th for the OU women with a 22:54.6. Catherine Odell was 56th with a 24:07.4 followed by Amanda Luksetich, who was 57th with a 24:08.7, and Andrea Bonner, who was 62nd with a 24:12.7. Other Sooner finishers included Kristi Cook, who covered the course in 25:23.9, and Jackie Dubois, who finished in 27:46.6.
The finishes by Kimeli, McNair and Eldridge earned them places on the All-Big 12 Cross Country team. That marks the first time in the eight years of Big 12 competition for OU to have two men on the All-Big 12 team and Eldridge is the first woman to earn the honor. The last time a Sooner man earned All-Big 12 honors was in 1996, the first year of league competition.
Several Sooners recorded career best finishes (in terms of placing) in the race. In addition to McNair, career best finishes were recorded by Call, Hutchins and Luksetich. The finishes by Kimeli, Coleman, Hussein, Culp, Schmiedeberg, Eldridge, Maye, Odell, Bonner and Cook also were career bests since this was their first time to compete in the Big 12.

Sooner History in the Regional Action

The last time the Sooner men qualified for the NCAA meet from regionals was in 1979 and the Sooner women have never made the NCAA field as a team. Going back to 1990, the Sooner women have finished as high as fifth in the regional meet and two OU runners, Kay Gooch in 1993 and Alice Braham in 1994, have won the individual title. For the OU men, the best finish since 1990 was ninth in 1995. The best finish for a Sooner individual was third by Conor Holt in 1992 and 1993.

Youth Will Be Served

The Sooner program has experienced a youth movement in 2003. To illustrate how young this team is, this time a year ago, five of the 12 runners competing for OU on Saturday were preparing for the state high school cross country championship or had just completed their high school season (Andrea Bonner, Jason Coleman, Jessica Eldridge, Catherine Odell and Tyler Schmiedeberg). One other, Nicola Maye, is redshirt freshmen in 2003 and did not compete in the regional meet last year.

Current Sooner History

Four of the 12 Sooners competing Saturday have experience competing for OU at an NCAA Regional. A quick look at how they have done (all-time best time/finish):
Jimmy Buchanan -- 31:06.76, 43rd (2002); Darren Hutchins -- 31:12.53, 49th (2002); Amanda Luksetich -- 23:35.85 (2001); Joe McNair -- 31:09.53, 46th (2002)
The times by McNair and Hutchins were career bests at the 10k distance.

And the Rest of the Story ...

Two Sooners, Silverus Kimeli and Blake Culp will be competing in the Midwest Regional meet for the first time in their careers. Kimeli transferred to OU from Arkansas and has previous experience competing in the South Central Regional. Culp joined the Sooner program in January and did not compete in cross country last fall.

Career Best Marks

A total of eight of the 12 Sooners competing this weekend have established career best times this season in the distance they will be running this weekend.
Those with PRs this season include (time/meet):
Andrea Bonner, 22:50.86, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Jimmy Buchanan, 30:46.08, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Jason Coleman, 31:06.06, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Jessica Eldridge, 21:34.43, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Amanda Luksetich, 23:30.60, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Nicola Maye, 21:56.28, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Joe McNair, 30:05.37, Arkansas Chile Pepper; Catherine Odell, 22:41.38, Arkansas Chile Pepper
This weekend's race will be the first 10k this season for Blake Culp and Tyler Schmiedeberg. Darren Hutchins established his career best in the 10k (31:12.53) at last year's NCAA Regional Meet.

The Coach

Rodney Rothoff joined the Sooner coaching staff in August 2002 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.
His impact on the Sooners was demonstrated last November as the OU men finished 13th in the NCAA Regional, OU's best finish in the regional meet in six years. He also saw one of his runners, Aldwyn Sappleton, qualify for the 2003 NCAA Indoor and Outdoor meets and earn All-America honors in the outdoor 800.

The Coach Says

On the men's race: "OSU has separated itself from the group. I think the next four teams are probably Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa and Oklahoma."
On the women's race: Missouri has proven it is the team to beat. Then I think you have to look at Minnesota, Illinois and Southwest Missouri State.
On his teams: "For us to have success, we need to narrow the gap between our first and fifth runners, we have to stay with our race plan and we need to let the results of all our hard work show."
On what the Sooners learned from the Big 12: "With the weather conditions (hot and humid), the conference meet was physically challenging and we met the challenge. We can take the experience of racing in that meet. Our conference meet is as tough as the regional meet -- we won't see any stronger teams this weekend than we have already run against."
On the course: "It's a good course for us because we are familiar with it. With all the rain lately, the course may be sloppy but we are excited about running. And the weather conditions will be much better than they were two weeks ago."
Final thoughts: "Our training has gone very well and the teams have worked very hard. I hope all the hard work that they have put in this season will reap benefits this weekend. Our goal, from the beginning of the season, was to improve our team finishes at Big 12 and the regional. We did that at Big 12 and we are ready to see what happens Saturday. The training is done and it's time to see how we stack up against these other teams."

Next Up

Should the Sooners qualify, either as a team or individually, the NCAA Championships are set for Nov. 24 in Waterloo, Iowa. The last time an OU men's team qualified for the NCAA was in 1979 and an OU women's team has never qualified for the NCAA. The last time a Sooner individual made the trip to the NCAA was in 1996 for the OU women (Melissa Gilbertson) and in 1995 for the OU men (Conor Holt and Craig Kirkwwod). Gilbertson finished 72nd while Holt was 14th and Kirkwood was 49th.
If no Sooners make the NCAA meet, the distance runners will begin preparations for the OU indoor track and field season which will open on Jan. 17 when the Sooners host the OU Classic at the Mosier Indoor Facility.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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