2017-18 Shocker Women XC and Track & Field

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Ladies finish 2nd at the Air Force Team Challenge quadrangular meet.

BYU - 146
Wichita State - 118.5
Colorado State - 102.5
Air Force - 90

A pretty decent showing for the Lady Shocks considering the rebuilding mode they are in.

The Lady Shocks followed the men's lead by taking first and second in the long jump and triple jump. Meghan Holmes would win the long jump (5.68m/18-7.75) and Skaila White would place second (5.39m/17-8.25), both with personal records. Holmes would win the triple jump with an indoor personal record 12.37m/40-7, followed by White in second with her own personal record 11.76m/38-7.

Kelsey Slawson won the women's shot put with a mark of 14.94m/49-0.25 and Tyra Bickham would take second (14.57m/47-9.75).

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/1/19/track-and-field-men-finish-first-griffin-sets-school-record.aspx

[1972Shocker]

Sully takes a look at Rebekah Topham's redshirt decision in the 2nd part of this article.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/1/30...-in-texas.aspx

[1972Shocker]

Highlights from the Herm Wilson Invitational:

Shocker Jr. Kelsey Slawson, out of Paola, Kansas, set a new WSU indoor shot put record with a toss of 50-2. It has always been her goal to break 50 feet. She did that once before in an intra-squad meet which doesn't count in the record books. Now it is official. That's the 5th best throw in the AAC this year.

Alex Adams, a Jr. who competed unattached (redshirting), won the weight throw at 52-5.25. This throw would probably not score in the AAC Championship thus the benefit of redshirting.

Sr. Meghan Holmes and Fr. Skaila White went 1-2 in the triple jump at 39-2.5 and 37.7.75 respectively. Would like to see one or both of them break the 40 foot mark by AAC Championship time. Fr. Jaden Damon, out of Goddard Eisenhower and redshirting, also had a solid jump of 37-7.25 to finish 3rd unattached. Meghan went 40-7 at Air Force which is tied for 4th best in the AAC this year.

Jr. Katie Murray, out of Rolla, Kansas, won the high jump at 5-6. A little off of her PR of 5-7.25 but Katie has improved significiantly over the past year. Her PR is tied for 3rd best in the AAC this year with two other competitors.

Shocker Jr. Rebekah Topham won the mile run in 4:48.35. It was Rebekah's desire to redshirt this season plus the boatload of talent that graduated at the end of last season that lead to Coach Rainbolt's decision to go big on redshirting many of his female athlete's this year with an eye to the future. That is 2.6 seconds off of Rebekah's best this season. Her best time would be #1 in the AAC if she was actively competing. Redshirt Fr. Winnie Koskei was 2nd at 5:12.80 which would not be good enough to score points at the AAC Championships.

The Lady Shocks will not be very competitive in the AAC this year. At best I see them scoring about 25 points in the AAC Championships which probably puts them in the bottom 3 or 4 (9th to 12th).

[1972Shocker]

HOKA NAZ Elite @NAZ_Elite Feb 8

A historic day! The first of many hard workouts together for @kellyn_taylor & @aliphinetuliamu!!

[1972Shocker]

The AAC Indoor Track & Field Chamnpionships are this Friday and Saturday (Feb 23-24) in Birmingham, Alabama.

Championship Central: http://theamerican.org/sports/2018/2...8.aspx?id=320&

The Shocker women;s teams is in a major rebuilding phase this year (redshirting around 26 athletes) and they will not be a signfiicant factor in this year's meet.

The following Shocker ladies do have times in the AAC top ten this season and have a chance to pick up a few points:

400m Run - #10 Seed - Jr. Natalie Halfman (56.74).

Distance Medley - #7 Seed

High Jump - 3-Way Tie for #3 Seed - Jr. Katie Murray (5-7.25)

Pole Vault - #3 Seed - Jr. Alesa Frey (12-8)

Long Jump - #9 Seed - Sr. Meghan Holmes (18-7.75)

Triple Jump - 2-Way Tie for #4 Seed - Sr. Meghan Holmes (40-7)

Shot Put - #7 Seed - Jr. Kelsey Slawson (50-2)

Pentathlon - #5 Seed - Fr. Kendra Harvey (3,502)

Top 8 finishers score using a 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 scoring system.

Based on the performance charts looks like the Lady Shocks will probably only score about 20-25 points. But we only have 1 Sr. in our top 10 seeds so if nothing else the Ladies will gain some valuable experience. And who knows we may get a PR or two from the Ladies.

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Fr. Kendra Harvey is 4th after 3 events (60H, HJ, SP) in the pentathlon with 2,243 points with the LJ and 800 left. Shocker Jr. Carlea Miles in in 8th with 2,141 points.

3rd through 6th place are pretty tightly bunched. Kendra is not a real strong long jumper. She is okay in the 800.

Update: Kendra and Carlea both had relatively poor results in the LJ. Kendara falls to 7th and Carlea is in 9th. They both will need good 800m runs to finish in the scoring (Top 8).

Update: Neither Kendra nor Carlea wre able to move up after the 800. In fact, Carlea fell to 13th and Kendra fell to 9th (1 point behind the 8th place finish) the Shocks will not score in the pentathlon.

Kendra, a freshman, was 44 point shy of her PR but I think she has some upside. Needs to develop more speed for the 60H and the LJ. More stamina strength and stamina should come as she matures. Carlia actaully set a new PR by 228 points which was a nice effort by her.

[1972Shocker]

The women had 30 runners vying for 8 spots in the finals. The Shockers best chance was Natalie Halfman but she finsihed 13th and didn't make the finals.

[1972Shocker]

Sometimes you are just totally overmatched. in the women's 20-lb weight throw Shocker Jr. Meghan Williams finished 21st out of 23 competitors with a toss of 46-2. But Cincy aparently has the top weight thrower in the country as Sr. Annette Echikunwoke won with a toss of 72-8. Thought they might have to find a bigger throwing venue.

[1972Shocker]

While the expectations for the Lady Shocks in the AAC Indoor T&F Championships were very low it still is a bit humbling when you actually live down to those expectations. I was hoping the Shocks would score maybe 20-25 points but they only managed to score 16.3333 putting them dead last (12th).

I predicted Tulsa would win the 3 points in the Havoc in the Heartland series for finishing higher than the Shocks put I didn't really think they would do that by scoring only 18 points.

Cincy dominated the meet finishing with 147 points to 65 for runner up SMU.

Not really much to say other that hopefully the heavy redshirting this year will allow the Shocks to be somewhat more competitive next year. We know for sure Rebekah Topham will be near the top of whatever event she will compete in.

[1972Shocker]

Despite the Shocker women's team,not being a factor in the AAC this year there were a few noteworthy individual performances by the Shocker Ladies at the AAC Championships.

R-Sr. Meghan Holmes was the only member of the Shocker women's team to earn All-Confeerence honors with her 3rd place finish in the triple jump with a 40-4.75 effort on her final jump of the competition. The neat thing about Meghan is she is a girl who wasn't that strong when she started at WSU but she has hung with, worked hard and is now being rewarded for that hard work and determination. That kind of leadership by example will be missed.

Jr. Kelsey Slawson bettered her school record in the Shot Put with a toss of 50-9.5 as she finished 4th.

Something to look forward to next year is that Rebekah Topham's PR from a year ago would have won both the mile and the 3k in this year's AAC Indoor Championship. And she will have gained two years of maturity and development between the time of those PR's and next year's meet. That could be worth more points than the entire team scored this year.

[1972Shocker]

The Shockers open their outdoor season Friday at the Emporia State Spring Invite. 14 Shocker women will be competing, mostly in the throwing events.

All 14 women competing in the meet will be competing in a throwing event and the Shockers are loaded in the javelin. Four current Shockers have an all-time top-10 mark in the javelin and three of the athletes have won a conference championship at-least once in their career. School record holder and two-time Missouri Valley Conference champion Carlea Miles leads the Shocker women in the javelin with a personal best mark of 50.28m/164-11, followed by 2014 MVC Champion Meagan Williams who has the sixth furthest mark in school history (46.05m/151-1) and 2015 MVC Champion Andrea Navarro who has the ninth furthest mark of 44.37m/145-7. Kelsey Tenbrink enters the 2018 season after setting a personal best mark of 44.15m/144-10, and the 10th best mark in school history, at the MVC Championships finishing fourth. Tyra Bickham, Kelsey Slawson and Alex Adams will lead the Shocks in the discus, each of their personal best marks rank in WSU's all-time top-10. Bickham leads the group at No. 2 (52.24m/171-5), followed by Slawson at No. 6 (48.39m/158-9) and Adams at No. 10 (44.86m/147-2). Multi-event athletes Hannah Cole, Kendra Henry, Miles, Jalen Milligan and Maria Romero will each compete in the 200m, 100m Hurdles and Javelin. After setting personal best in the shot put and weight throw during the 2018 indoor season, freshmen Cassidy Androff and Amanda Kakoulias look to carry that momentum into the 2018 outdoor season, each will compete in the discus and hammer, while Kakoulias will also enter in the javelin.

Looks like the Shocks have the potential to score some points in the javelin come AAC time which would be very welcomed since they struggled to score much at the AAC Indoor Chanpionship.

It's early in the spring season and Wichita State and UMKC are the only D-1 teams at this meet so we are primarily comparing the results against how the Ladies have performed in the past.

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Jr. Kelsey Slawson set a new school record in the Outdoor Shot put at the Texas Relays with a put of 49-9.25. However, Kelsey has thrown 50-9.25 indoors. The 49-9.25 is 6th best in teh AAC this Spring.

Sr. Tyra Bickham threw 16-.3 in the discus in Austin. Ttha's a couple feet shy of her PR and good for 4th best in the AAC so far this Spring.

[1972Shocker]

The Shockers pulled out of the John Jacobs Invitational at OU this weekend due to the high probability of thunderstorms. They lost a good chunk of the KT Woodman to weather last weekend and what they were able to get in was not under great conditions. As an alternative they will head over to Cemtral Missouri to compete in the Mule Relays on Friday.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/4/19...le-relays.aspx

About the only notable performance at the UCM Mule Relays was Jr. Katie Murray's high jump of 5-8 which was a new PR for her and ties her for 4th best in the AAC this season.

[1972Shocker]

The Shocks are sending some of their distance runners to Des Moines to compete at the Drake Relays on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/4/26/track-and-field-shocks-prepared-for-quadrangular.aspx

A larger contingent of Shocker athletes are headed to Lubbock, Texas to compete in a quadrangualr against host Texas Tech, Kansas State and Nebraska.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/4/26/track-and-field-shocks-prepared-for-quadrangular.aspx

[1972Shocker]

Shocker Winnie Koskei set a new PR in the 5k at Drake running a 16:30.16 which is the 6th best time in Shocker history and 2nd best in AAC this season. Winnie has a long way to go to catch Aliphine Tuliamuk WSU record is 15:18.86 but she has a few more years to work on that. Winnie's time broke her previous best by 35 seconds which is a very nice jump in performance. This time is about 20 seconds behind SMU's Hannah MIller on the AAC performance chart. Winnie is about 12.5 seconds behind her teammate Rebekkah Topham who has the 4th best time all-time at WSU.

Speaking of Rebekkah Topham, who is redshirting this year as a junior, she ran the 3,000m steeplechase at Drake unattached and finished second in 10:15.75. That would be a new PR for Rebekkah and the 2nd fastest time in Shocker history behind Mica Land's 10:12.28 but I don't think it counts as she is competing unattached this year. It also would be the best time in the AAC this year if she was not redshirting. But it is good to see that Rebekkah continues to improve.

http://goshockers.com/news/2018/4/26/track-and-field-koskei-runs-sixth-fastest-5k-in-wsu-history.aspx