University of Washington
Pac-12 Championships
Yorks, Meyers Run To Matching Thirds At Pac-12s
October 30, 2015 | Cross Country
COLFAX, Wash. – Seniors Izaic Yorks and Maddie Meyers have been delivering all year for the Husky cross country teams, and they saved their best Pac-12 Championship performances for their final ones, as they both earned career-best third-place individual finishes. Yorks and Meyers led Washington's men and women to matching fourth-place team finishes at the Colfax Golf Club, as Washington State played host to the conference championships.
The third-place finish for Yorks was the best finish ever by a Husky male at the conference meet in the forty years the race has been held. Five Husky men had finished fourth over the years, but Yorks becomes the first to crack the top-three. Meyers improved on her fifth-place finish from a year ago, earning the best finish by a Husky since Katie Flood's victory in 2011.
Colorado claimed both team titles today. In the final men's standings, the defending NCAA Champion Buffs got the win with 46 points, holding off 23rd-ranked Stanford which had a strong day scoring 57 points. The Huskies gave third-ranked Oregon a scare, as the Ducks were third with 83 points, while the 20th-ranked Huskies finished with 96. UW placed ahead of 15th-ranked UCLA which came in fifth with 127, with Washington State (137) and 21st-ranked California (157) in sixth and seventh and the Arizona schools rounding out the field.
The 12th-ranked Husky women finished fourth, but behind three top-10 teams. Colorado won its second women's title since joining the conference, finishing with 45 points, just edging No. 5 Oregon which scored 51. 10th-ranked Stanford had 80 points, holding off a late charge from the Huskies who scored 92. The Dawgs finished well ahead of 19th-ranked Utah, which was fifth with 149 points.
The Dawgs were in the mix in the men's 8,000-meters right from the get-go. Aiding the efforts in a big way was sophomore Colby Gilbert, who competed for the first time this season, and was UW's second runner today. Sophomore Fred Huxham, sophomore Andrew Gardner, and senior Tyler King along with Yorks gave UW its scoring five all up in the top-25 for much of the race. As things spread out late, Yorks kept progressing through the top-10 until he was alone in fourth around the final turns.
Yorks, the Lakewood, Wash. native, showed some of his middle distance speed that won him the Pac-12 1,500-meter title in the spring, winning an all-out spring at the line for third, beating Colorado's Pierce Murphy by less than a second, finishing in 23:15. Gilbert finished 18th in 23:42, followed closely by Huxham in 22nd in 23:48, King in 26th in 23:54, and Gardner in 27th in 23:56.
Sophomore Johnathan Stevens placed 39th in his second Pac-12 meet, crossing in 24:23. Redshirt freshman Mahmoud Moussa was 47th and freshman Charlie Barringer was 58th.
Head Coach Greg Metcalf couldn't have been more impressed with the effort of Yorks. “Izaic, that's the best finish by a Husky male ever at the championships. He was a professional today. He was mature, he covered when he needed to, and he finished well. I was incredibly proud of his effort,” said Metcalf. “After that I think our men ran really solid today. It was awesome having Colby Gilbert back in the mix and I think it was a herculean effort by him, he's been busting his butt the last couple weeks, and he ran great. Fred and Tyler and Andrew all had solid days and they battled through the middle, so I was very proud of our men's performance.”
Here comes the field! pic.twitter.com/kKjCePULbb
— UW Track (@UWTrack) October 30, 2015
The women started the 6,000-meter race with a group of four Dawgs up front, with Meyers, sophomore Anna Maxwell, freshman Charlotte Prouse, and sophomore Katie Knight all in good spots, and with another pack of four comprised of Kaylee Flanagan, Eleanor Fulton, Lindsey Bradley, and Emily Hamlin close behind.
Meyers, the three-time All-American, never was off the pace of the leaders, and when Stanford's Aisling Cuffe, the 2013 Pac-12 Champion, made a decisive move with around a thousand meters to go, Meyers went after her, moving into second-place heading towards the finish. Down the homestretch, Colorado's Kaitlyn Benner was able to catch Meyers, but the Husky leader powered across in third in a time of 19:56. Cuffe got her second title in 19:53. The third-place finish makes a trilogy for Meyers, as she was also third at the 2015 Pac-12 Track Championships in the 1,500-meters and the 5,000-meters.
Behind Meyers, Maxwell earned a second-straight top-20 finish as she placed 16th in 20:25. Prouse was one second behind her in 17th-place, and Knight finished 22nd in 20:34. Senior Eleanor Fulton came through to complete UW's scoring five with a 34th-place effort in 20:51. Flanagan took 40th and senior Jenna Sanders moved up well in the second half of the race to finish 46th, her first time in the top-seven at a championship race. Freshmen Hamlin and Bradley finished 50th and 57th, respectively, and sophomore Kelly Lawson also finished 77th.
Similar to Yorks, this was the final Pac-12 cross country meet for Meyers, but “thankfully she's got two more track seasons to run,” said Metcalf. “Maddie took a shot, I thought she had a chance to win coming into today, and for her to be third I thought was a great run for her. It's a solid run by Anna and great to see Charlotte bounce back from the sickness at Wisconsin, and Katie and Eleanor both ran well.
“I think in two weeks we'll run much better than we did today. But there are good teams in this conference and if you don't run your 'A' game then you get beat. Oregon and Colorado are really good teams and we battled Stanford for third. We have to recover and regroup and get ready to host the West Regional back in Seattle.”
The final hurdle for making it to the NCAA Championships will be that West Regional, which the Huskies will host on Nov. 13 at Jefferson Park Golf Course.
