Track and Field Women bring home first WAC title in school history, Men win Bronze
UVU Track and Field Women’s team took first in the WAC competition, securing the first WAC title in school history.
The Utah Valley Women’s Track and Field squad seized its first-ever WAC outdoor track & field Championship in school history. The Wolverines showed out on a record-breaking day, to bring back a title for its hometown.
The meet was held at Hal Wing Track & Field, this past Saturday, May 11th, where the Wolverines finished with a total of eight individual championships between the men and women.
The Men finished third overall with a score of 124, just one point behind Southern Utah who scored 125. Grand Canyon came away with yet another victory finishing with an outstanding 153 points to secure its fourth straight WAC outdoor title.
The Wolverine women won first place by a mile with a record-breaking final score of 177. GCU took second scoring 118 points while UT Arlington came in third by just .5 points scoring a 117.5.
Caila Odekirk won her second WAC title this week running in the 5,000. Odekirk got off to a phenomenal start and took over first with about 200 meters remaining and pulled away with a final time of 16:50.02 giving her another gold medal on top of her performance Thursday night in the 10,000.
Oakley Olson also had a memorable night adding her second silver of the WAC championships with a second-place finish in the 1500.
On this record-breaking weekend, the Wolverines clinched a total of seven school records, including the men. The men’s 4×100 squad finished first along with Noah Peterson clinching a pole vault Championship.
Caleb Furnell, Cameron Franklin, Kade Thompson, and Gabe Remy won the title for the men with a time of 39.21 which is the fastest ever recorded for UVU.
Larissa Dabb, Paige Young, and Ella Hooper were joined by Kali McEuen in the 4×400 final, setting a school record with a finish in 3:40.54.
The men’s 4×400 squad of Jacob Deming, Cameron Franklin, Brayden Walker, and Isaiah Archer finished in 3:11.19 for the second-best time in school history.
Franklin also broke the 400-meter record finishing in second at the championships with a final time of 46.30. Furnell and Thompson both finished in the top 10 from the 100-meter dash.
Utah Valley will await the following teams to finish the outdoor championships as many wait to see if they will qualify for the NCAA West Preliminary rounds that goes from May 22 to May 25 at the University of Arkansas.
Kaleb Dyer is a Senior Staff writer for the UVU Review. Kaleb was born and raised in Draper, Utah and is majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. In his free time, Kaleb loves watching all sports but mostly college football and basketball. He loves writing for Utah Valley sports page and his dream is to one day become a sports broadcaster and/or journalist.