SPOKANE, Wash. — Seven Gonzaga student-athletes will represent the University at the 2021 NCAA West Preliminary Round in Fayetteville, Ark., May 25-28. The NCAA Division I Men's and Women's Track and Field and Cross Country Committee announced the West Region and East Region Preliminary Round participants Thursday.
Three women's runners and four men's runners comprise the Bulldogs' envoy to Arkansas, including repeat qualifiers Kristen Garcia in the 10K and James Mwaura in the 10K and 5K. This will be Garcia's second year at regionals but first competing in the 10K after qualifying in the 5 last season. The total of seven qualifiers matches a program-best.
Evan Bates will join Mwaura in the 5K race, and Cooper Laird and Cullen McEachern rounded out the men's selections with qualifying times in the 3K Steeplechase.
Joining Garcia on the women's side will be Elisabeth Danis and Anderson in the 5K with Anderson competing in the 5K and 1500m. Both will be making their first regional appearances in a Zag uniform next weekend.
Garcia is seeded 15th in the 10K, an event in which she set the program record at the Stanford Invite on April 2 for her seed time of 33:27.49. Danis' seed time of 16:09.07 from the Bryan Clay Invite ranks as the second-fastest in program history and 27th in the field, with Anderson's 47th-ranked seed time of 16:15.23 just behind as the third fastest by a Zag and her 32nd-ranked 1500m time of 4:21.68 standing as the second-fastest in program history.
On the men's side, Mwaura leads the pack with the 13th-seeded 5K time in the region at 13:30.02 and the 16th-seeded 10K time at 28:29.01 — both program records set at Oregon's Hayward Field, the site of the upcoming 2022 National Championships. Bates is seeded 40th with a 13:45.04 time from the Oregon Relays that ranks as the second fastest in program history. McEachern's 23rd-seeded 8:46.36 time and Laird's 43rd-ranked time of 8:50.88 round out the Zags' qualifiers in the steeplechase.
For each individual event contested at each of the Preliminary Round sites, the top 48 declared student-athletes will be accepted into the competition. The University of Indiana will in Bloomington, Ind. will host the East Preliminary and Texas A&M University, in Fayetteville, Ark., will host the West Preliminary. The qualifiers out of these two regions will compete in the NCAA Division I Men's and Women's Outdoor Track and Field Championships held June 8-11 in Eugene, Ore.
Student-athletes with the top 12 times or marks and the best 12 relay teams at both the East and West Preliminary Rounds sites will qualify for the NCAA Championships in Eugene in June.
The NCAA West Preliminaries will be broadcast live on the SEC Network, with a live stream on Watch ESPN. Live results will be available through GoZags.com.
