2015 SCHEDULE
SPOKANE, Wash. - The Gonzaga University women's and men's track and field teams will have a full slate of indoor and outdoor competition this upcoming season.
The Zags' 2015 schedule features 19 meets, with 16 being regular season events. GU will make six stops on its indoor schedule, before it heads outdoors for the rest of the year. The schedule begins with the University of Washington Indoor Preview on Jan. 17. It will be the first of three indoor meets run at the Dempsey Center in Seattle.
"Our goal is to run our top athletes at the University of Washington's fast 300-meter Mondo track at the Dempsey Center," Gonzaga men's track and field Head Coach Pat Tyson said. "It is a venue we will compete at three times and hopefully get an athlete or two to qualify for the NCAA Indoor Championships.
"We have a nice posse of candidates in Willie Milam, Nick Roche, Troy Fraley, Colin O'Neil, Robert Walgren, Andy Phillips, and Kyle Branch among others. It is our goal to continue to break Gonzaga indoor records and reshape the landscape of our distance running program. It is not our goal to peak indoors, it is our goal to stay motivated and get some great test efforts in."
Along with the UW Preview, the Bulldogs visit Seattle for the UW Invitational on Jan. 30-31, and the Husky Classic on Feb. 13-14. The Zags compete at the Idaho Collegiate on Jan. 23, and the WSU Open on Feb. 6, as well.
"We are not looking to peak indoors, but based on continued growth in fitness we should be able to see some significant improvements and see an increase in racing IQ," Gonzaga women's Head Coach Patty Ley said. "We will see if we can we learn to race well. While we may not have anyone quite ready for a nationals push, we will entertain that possibility if it arises."
The indoor schedule completes with the NCAA Indoor National Championships in Fayetteville, Ark., on March 13-14.
The outdoor schedule opens with the Buc Scoring meet hosted by Whitworth on March 19-20. The following week, the Zags are at the Vandal Jamboree, before splitting squads for the San Francisco State Distance Carnival, Stanford Invitational, and the Sam Adams Classic on April 3-4.
The Bulldogs remain local on April 11 and 16, for the Washington versus Region meet at Spokane Falls Community College and the Whitworth Twilight. Splitting squads again, GU is at the Mt. Sac and Oregon Relays on April 16-18. Spokane Falls then hosts the Duane Hartman Invitational on April 24-25.
After a two week break, the Zags compete in the BYU Last Chance Invitational in Provo, Utah, for their regular season meet. The NCAA West Regional Championships is in Austin, Texas, on May 28-30, followed by the NCAA Outdoor National Championships in Eugene, Ore., on June 10-13.
"Outdoors, we have a perfect schedule to get our kids to qualify for the big show in late May for regionals, and early June for nationals," Tyson said. "We have Stanford, San Francisco State, and Oregon Relays in Eugene, plus a great last chance qualifying opportunity in Provo, Utah in mid-May. We have two big returnees on the men's side in Milam (5000-meter school record holder at 14:00.19) and Roche (3000-meter steeplechase school record holder at 8:59.29); both competed at the Western Preliminaries in Fayetteville, Ark., last year."
"We will see some more from our middle distance crew indoors, then look for a bigger push from our top distance ladies outdoors," Ley said. "We're looking for potential west regional qualifiers in a 10k or steeple relatively early, and then build through the season as needed to run well at the end of the season. The schedule has a nice mix of elite or emerging elite races for our top end and developmental level races for our athletes who are growing. The key, as in any season, will be to keep athletes healthy and progressing throughout the year. Not the easiest thing to do in the Inland Northwest as winter sets in!"
