WICHITA – The Wichita State track and field team is set to compete in the three-day American Athletic Conference Outdoor Championship meet Friday, May 13^th through Sunday, May 15^th at Cessna Stadium.
 
The Shocker men are neck-and-neck with Houston in the USTFCCCA conference rankings, with Houston being the favorite to win the championship and the Cincinnati men not far behind in third. The Cougars have won six of the seven American Outdoor Championships to date and are coming off their seventh straight conference indoor victory. Wichita State is the 31-point underdog entering the competition, but the Shockers are not unfamiliar with battling to give the Cougars a run for their money.
 
"We feel like we have a really nice men's team, and the guys are excited to compete for a high team finish," head coach Steve Rainbolt said. "Houston is always an incredible opponent and certainly will be the favorite in this track meet. We will go in with an underdog mentality and a chip on our shoulder ready to compete with a strong spirit to battle as hard as we can to try to win a team title."
 
The last time the Shockers hosted the outdoor championship meet in 2019, the race for the team title came down to the final two events. Wichita State was down by only one point with just the 5,000 meters and the 4x400-meter relay to go but ultimately came up just short of earning their first AAC outdoor title.
 
Houston will bring depth in the sprints, mid-distance and jumps as they hold the top three spots in the 100-meter dash rankings and take up half of the scoring places in the 200 meters, 800 meters and 400-meter hurdles rankings. The Cougars have the conference-leading marks in the 400 meters, 110-meter hurdles, 400-meter hurdles, 4x100-meter relay, 4x400-meter relay and pole vault.
 
The Shockers will rely on their versatility as they have athletes in scoring position on the form chart in 19 of the 21 events and have 11 top-three marks. Tanner Brown leads the conference in the decathlon with 7,178 points, and teammate Adria Navajon Fabregat will make his outdoor multi-event debut this weekend as he looks to capitalize off his AAC indoor heptathlon title from earlier this year. Two-time All-American Michael Bryan looks to earn his first outdoor conference title in the hammer throw after earning all-conference honors in 2021 with his second-place finish and winning the indoor conference weight throw in February. In the javelin, Taran Taylor is looking for a repeat performance from 2021 when he threw 68.04m/223-3 to win the title. Rounding out the conference leads for the Shockers, Adam Moore holds the top spot in the 800 meters with a time of 1:50.80.
 
In order to beat Houston, the Shockers will need to outperform the form charts and move up in multiple events.
 
"We're going to move up the form chart, and if we do that enough times, and especially if we knock off the right people…that's a swing in our favor," Rainbolt said.
 
In the women's team rankings, the Shocker women moved up to No. 6 in the conference rankings with UCF, the 2022 AAC indoor champions, being heavily favored to win the team championship.
 
The Shocker women have 10 athletes in scoring position on the form chart. Amanda Kakoulias leads the way as the No. 3 shot putter in the conference with a mark of 15.45m/50-8.25. In the pole vault, Margaux Thompson and Karen Lyvers are ranked fifth and sixth, respectively, with a good chance to score and move up. Lyvers is coming off two-straight meets with personal-best clearances and both athletes have etched their names on the WSU all-time list. Semaj McGhee leads the Shockers' nationally-ranked triple jump squad with her No. 5 conference ranking and also sits in scoring position in the high jump. Samantha Marx and Kourtni Hubert both enter the meet in scoring position in the javelin, and Brianna Utecht and Maria Romero look to score points for the Shockers in the heptathlon with their respective No. 5 and No. 8 conference marks.
 
The men's hammer and men's decathlon will lead off the conference action Friday at noon. For the full meet schedule, visit theamerican.org/otf.
 

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EVENT COACH QUOTABLES
 
John Wise – Sprints/Hurdles
"We have a couple different objectives this week. Our men are competing to try to win a championship, and our women are kind of focused more individually as we're redshirting some people, and we've got some injuries and things like that, so for the women it's more to see if we can get some people to the first round of the NCAA and to get some people that haven't competed in this meet or haven't scored before into the scoring, which is important as we're building that team back up for future years. Our goal for our group for the men is to score as many points as we can to help our team win the meet. The relays need to have a good weekend, and everybody contributes there. We've got people in every event that could potentially score in the sprints, which is exciting, but it's a really good league in the sprints and hurdles, so we have to come ready to compete. I think being at home will help, and we are getting healthy, so we're definitely excited and feeling like we're ready for our best meet of the year."
 
Kirk Hunter - Distance
"On the men's side, we're obviously hoping to get up in the scoring as high as possible, maybe have some champions. I know the guys are also looking to see if they can get some first-round qualifiers (NCAA), so we've got some pretty lofty goals, and in our conference, that's tough to do. We've got Tulsa and some of the other schools that make it very difficult to get up in the scoring, but definitely on the men's side we want to try to get some of those big points and help out the team towards hopefully a team championship.
 
On the women's side, we're looking for improvement, growth and experience. We do have two or three girls in there that we're going to try to jump up into the scoring and do some things that we hope surprise the conference and will lead us towards better things next year. We have some good talent on the women's side, and they're just young and learning, and we hope that they can use this as a developmental tool, so that next year will be even better."
 
Heidi Benton – Horizontal Jumps
"Super excited about the men and women horizontal jumpers. We've got four guys competing in the open long jump/triple jump. I would consider Yuben [Goncalves] kind of a secret weapon that we have. He's been training all year in the jumps after getting over some injury. The last time he competed in the long and triple jump was at the outdoor conference championship last year down in Florida, so those are good marks that'll get him up in the scoring, especially in the triple jump. Dowdy [Elazarig], in the triple jump, has been coming along nicely. He's PRed in that event, but I still feel like he has room for improvement and hasn't reached his potential this year, so looking for the nice weather and hopefully not strong winds to carry him through. I'm looking forward to watching him compete for sure. Morgan Conner is a guy who I feel like is very consistent…and Adria [Navajon] is our fourth guy, and he's also doing the multi and the hurdles. He knocked it out of the park indoor running all over the place and did well, so we're looking for a repeat performance from him even though it'll be a little bit harder with the decathlon. It'll be fun to watch those guys compete.
 
On the women's side, we're stronger on the triple jump side of things. In the [USTFCCCA] event squad rankings, we were as high as 10^th in the nation. Looking forward to watching all of those girls compete. For long jump, hopefully somebody can pop off a good mark and we can get up close to the scoring. We're just looking for improvement as we go into the conference meet. It's the last meet for the majority of them, so we're looking forward to seeing them improve on their marks and their placing."
 
John Hetzendorf - Throws
"I'm excited for my group. On the guy's side, I've got two guys that are at the top of the conference in the javelin and the hammer with Taran Taylor and Michael Bryan. I'm excited to see what both of those guys end up doing. Both of those guys have a good shot at the national meet, and I'm excited to see what they can do this weekend. There's good competition in both of those events, so it will be fun to watch.
 
Also on the men's side, I've got a good group of discus throwers that are all up in the scoring and throwing well. I feel like they're on the verge of throwing farther, and hopefully we can get it done. With all the guys, I'm just excited to see what we do. On the women's side, I've got a group of javelin girls that can get up in the scoring. Amanda Kakoulias in the shot put will have a really good chance of scoring and doing some good things. I'm just hoping we can realize some of the potential we've been seeing on both the men and the women and the weather looks like it's going to cooperate, and hopefully the athletes do their part and we get some big performances."
 
Pat Wilson – Pole Vault
"It's pretty exciting to see Margaux [Thompson] and Karen [Lyvers] working their way up the all-time list. They're certainly in scoring position. The potential is there for a lot of really good things in this event. I've seen practices and jumps in meets out of both of them that would suggest that the table is set for something really good. Just like anything, you've got to see it through on the day it matters. We've also got some other vaulters that shouldn't be counted out. If they have a good day and things go right, they might sneak into the scoring as well."