OSU Gears Up for NCAA Championships

Wednesday, June 7

Eugene, Ore.

All Day

Oklahoma State University

NCAA Outdoor Championships

June 05, 2017 | Cowboy Cross Country & Track, Cowgirl Cross Country & Track

MEET NOTES

The Basics
The best in the nation meet at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon, for a shot at supremacy.
The 2017 NCAA Outdoor Championships will include more than 1,000 male and female student-athletes representing more than 100 institutions.
Oklahoma State will send eight athletes to the NCAA Championships in six events.
The 2016 NCAA Championships saw SEC teams take the men's and women's team titles in Florida and Arkansas.

Follow the Meet
Live results for the 2017 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships will be available online at ncaa.org.
Fans who make the trip to Eugene can purchase tickets to the four-day championship event online through the University of Oregon ticket office.
Weekend-long tickets start at $44 for adults and single-day tickets start at $11.
Results and a full recap of Oklahoma State's days in the Beaver State will be available on okstate.com following each day's events.

Broadcast Information (CT)
ESPN is the exclusive broadcaster for the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, and all four days can be streamed on ESPN3 and the WatchESPN App.
The first day, which is the opening of the men's competition, can be found on ESPN3 beginning at 2:30 p.m., then the broadcast moves to ESPNU beginning at 6:30. The prime time events will air on ESPN2 at 7:30.
Thursday's women's events begin streaming at 12:30 p.m., on ESPN3 and the events move to ESPN2 at 6:30 p.m.
The final day of the men's competition gets started at 2:30 p.m. on ESPN3, and can be seen on ESPN during the prime time slot, beginning at 7:30.
The women's finals open at 1:30 p.m., Saturday on ESPNU, then ESPN takes over at 5:30.

What to Watch For – NCAA Championships
Seven of Oklahoma State's eight entries in the NCAA Championships are making their outdoor championship debuts, leaving Kaela Edwards as the only returning athlete for OSU.
Edwards runs in the 1,500-meter semi for the second consecutive year. Last year she finished sixth in the 1,500 and this season, she took fourth in the mile at the indoor championships.
Kaylee Dodd, Jacob Fincham-Dukes and Josh Thompson all had individual appearances at indoor championships and are back in the 800, long jump and 1,500, respectively, outdoors.
Craig Nowak and Hassan Abdi both ran on the Cowboy DMR team that took sixth at the indoor championships in March. They make their outdoor debuts in the 1,500 and 10,000-meter runs, respectively.
Sylvester Barus will join Abdi in the 10K for his first NCAA outdoor appearance, and Ieva Zarankaite makes her NCAA Championship debut in the discus.
Zarankaite has scored in three events this season at the conference level and was the only OSU athlete to compete in two events at the West Regional.
The men's championship begins Wednesday and concludes Friday, while the women's championship begins Thursday and ends Saturday.

Last Time Out
Eight OSU athletes punched tickets to the NCAA Outdoor Championships at the NCAA West Preliminary Rounds in Austin, Texas.
Jacob Fincham-Dukes was the first Cowboy to clinch a place when the Big 12 champion leapt to his first outdoor championship appearance in the long jump.
Hassan Abdi and Sylvester Barus scored places in the 10K final when they finished 11th and 12th respectively Thursday night.
Kaylee Dodd and Ieva Zarankaite advanced in the 800 and discus throw on the second day. It is their first outdoor appearances, and Dodd's second NCAA appearance of the year as she finished ninth at the indoor championships back in March.
All-Americans Kaela Edwards, Craig Nowak and Josh Thompson all advanced on the final day of the West Prelims in he 1,500.

Edwards' Last Run
This weekend in Eugene will be Kaela Edwards' last weekend of competition as a Cowgirl, but a fitting way to put a bow on her historic Cowgirl career.
With her fourth-place finish at the NCAA Indoor Championships back in March, Edwards claimed a tie for the school-record for most points scored at indoor championships by an OSU athlete with 29. She has scored 33 overall and has a chance to become the highest scoring Cowgirl at NCAA Championships with a favorable finish this weekend.

Cowgirl scoring at NCAA Championships
1. Jackie Goodman - 42 pts.
2. Christine McMiken - 37
3. Nataljia Piliusina - 36
4. Kaela Edwards - 33
5. Savannah Camacho - 14

OSU Scoring at NCAA Championships
1. Joe Dial - 57
2. Jackie Goodman - 42
3. Christine McMiken - 37
4. Nataljia Piliusina - 36
T5. Kaela Edwards - 33
T5. Nick Miller – 33

With her outdoor 800-meter title at the Big 12 Championships, she claimed the Cowgirl record for most Big 12 titles, with seven, and points scored at conference championships, 94.

A Closer Look at the Numbers
The Cowboys' history of scoring in the 1,500 and 10,000 is stronger than it seems.
While the Pokes come in at 18th all-time in 1,500-meter scoring and 15th in 10,000-meter scoring, OSU has the joint-seventh-most 1,500-meter titles in NCAA history, and with eight entries across history, the 50 points scored averages out to 6.25 points per entry, the fourth-most by any school.
In the 10K, OSU's six All-Americans have scored 33 points, giving the program an average of 5.5 points per entry, which is the seventh-highest in the NCAA.
Among the Big 12, only Kansas and Texas have scored more in the 1,500 than OSU, and only Texas and Iowa State top the Pokes in 10K scoring all-time.

The British Invasion
Kaylee Dodd and Jacob Fincham-Dukes have been thrust into the spotlight for the Oklahoma State track and field program this year, and the two England internationals have performed their best under the bright lights.
Since 2016, Dodd has provided 33 points for the Cowgirls at conference championships, including a DMR title and two runner-up finishes in the outdoor 800.
Fincham-Dukes is the highest scorer in the long jump in the conference since his Cowboy debut back in 2016. He has scored 28 points across the four championships and claimed the long jump title at the outdoor championships in early May.
The two just missed out on scoring in their NCAA Championship debuts back in March, with Dodd taking ninth in the 800 and Fincham-Dukes earning 10th. Coming into the outdoor championships, though, they both took fourth at the West Prelims, recording outdoor personal bests.

Craig Nowak: A Renaissance
Craig Nowak has been the epitome of consistency in his last two seasons with the Cowboys.
While his Cowboy career was riddled with injuries and illness during his freshman and sophomore campaigns, Nowak has blossomed into one of the most decorated middle-distance runners in the program and heads to his first outdoor championship seeking his first individual All-America honor since the 2014 cross country season.
Nowak won his first Big 12 title during the indoor season back in 2016 and followed it up with a 1,500-meter title outdoors. The Cowboy senior has scored 61 points and won four conference titles since 2016. Prior to that season, he has only scored one point for the Cowboys, but was an All-American in cross country.
Nowak takes to the track for the 1,500-meter semifinal in his first NCAA Outdoor Championship race looking for his second All-America honor of the year and first individual honor since his renaissance.

Thompson And Abdi's Race To History
Josh Thompson and Hassan Abdi have the chance to become the first Cowboys since the 1996-97 season to earn first-team All-America honors in all three NCAA athletics seasons.
Abdi took 16th at the NCAA Cross Country Championships and ran on the Cowboy DMR team that took sixth at the indoor championships in March.
Thompson finished 36th at the NCAA Cross Country Championships and finished sixth in the mile indoors.
The last Cowboy to secure All-America honors in three consecutive NCAA athletics seasons was Christopher Kenebei 20 years ago.