Cross Country Opens Big 12, Regional Title Defense at Home

Thursday, September 1

Stillwater

Oklahoma State University

Cowboy Duals

The Cowboys and Cowgirls took home Big 12 and Regional titles in 2015

Cross Country Opens Big 12, Regional Title Defense at Home

August 31, 2016 | Cowboy Cross Country & Track, Cowgirl Cross Country & Track

STILLWATER – The Oklahoma State cross country teams will begin their campaigns at home this season with the second running of the Cowboy Duals.

The No. 8 Cowgirls send 29 athletes out to the OSU Cross Country Course, including the highest returning finisher from the NCAA Championships a season ago Natalie Baker, NCAA mile champion Kaela Edwards and NCAA 5,000-meter runner-up Aurora Dybedokken among others.

In the men's 5K race, highly-touted transfers Sylvester Barus and Hassan Abdi make their Cowboy debuts alongside Josh Thompson, Cerake Geberkidane and redshirt freshman Sukhi Khosla.

The Cowboys and Cowgirls welcome a respectable quintet of programs to Stillwater in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tulsa, Wichita State and Oral Roberts, Thursday.
Arkansas' teams earned preseason top-15 spots (men sixth, women 11th), Tulsa's men got a nod at No. 27 and the Oklahoma's men come in at 19 as the second-highest ranked Big 12 squad behind the Pokes at 11.

The Cowboy Duals is set to begin at 8 a.m., with the women's 3K race and the men's 5K race will follow.

A complete set of results from each race will be available on okstate.com following the conclusion of the event.

Cowgirls open the season at No. 8, Cowboys at 11 in USTFCCCA Preseason Poll
The United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association released its national men's and women's cross country preseason rankings, and both Oklahoma State squads claimed top-15 places to open 2016.

The Cowgirls cracked the top-10 in the preseason poll for the first time since 2006, coming in at No. 8. They hold the No. 1 spot in the Midwest Region for the first time to start the season, and are the highest ranked Big 12 team overall.

Conference powerhouse Iowa State came in at 17 in the preliminary poll, Kansas comes in at 21 and Texas, West Virginia and Baylor all received votes.

The Cowboys lead the Midwest Region again, and are ranked 11th nationally, putting them in the top-25 for the 11th consecutive season.

The Pokes lead in-state rivals Oklahoma, who slotted in at 19 as the only other Big 12 team ranked nationally to begin the year. Texas and Iowa State's men's teams each received votes.

Quotes from Director of Track and Field and Cross Country Dave Smith

On what the opening meet does for the teams
"This is just a good early season test to see where we are and for some of the young athletes – mostly those who haven't run in our top-seven – to give them an opportunity to run at home against some good competition in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Oral Roberts, Tulsa and Wichita State. It's a really good group of teams coming, so I think there is a lot of excitement to go against some of the better teams in the country."

On the Cowgirl newcomers running Thursday
"Most of the freshmen we're going to not run because we're not sure if we're going to redshirt them yet or not. Kami Hankins, Carly Flinn, Kaylee Oyler, Bailey Sutherlin, those four are going to have their first test in an OSU uniform and it'll be fun to see how they handle this course, which is a really tough course. Most of them have run it in high school, but we're running a portion of the course they haven't run before, so it'll be good to see how they adjust."

On the Cowboy newcomers running Thursday
"On the men's side we're running Sukhi Khosla and it'll be his first race for OSU after he redshirted last year. It'll be good to get him out there in the bright orange to see where he's going to fall in our lineup. For the most part it's sort of just an early season measuring stick to see where we are with some of our young guys."

On the USTFCCCA Preseason Rankings (Cowboys No. 11, Cowgirls No. 8)
"I think it's probably about where we should be. Both teams in my mind have a chance to be trophy teams if we stay healthy. I think the men probably fell off of everybody's radar because we had a tough season last year and if you look at our lineup, we have nobody coming back who's ever finished in the top-100 at the NCAA Championships – that doesn't bode well. But a lot of the guys ran really well in the track season. Cerake Geberkidane won three Big 12 titles last year and finished 11th at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the 5,000, and Josh Thompson ran a 3:58 mile, a 3:39 1,500 and won two Big 12 Championships. I think Sylvester Barus is a legitimate top-10 threat at the National Championships and Hassan Abdi will surprise some people as well. He's very tough, he reminds me of Joseph Manilafasha who might not have the best track credentials but when you put him in a cross country race, he was an All-American."

Cowboy Entries:
Hassan Abdi, Anthoney Armstrong, Sylvester Barus, Matthew Fayers, Noah Gade, Cerake Geberkidane, Brigham Hedges, Sukhi Khosla, Christian Liddell, Luis Martinez, Josh Thompson

Cowgirl Entries:
Cheyenne Allison, Natalie Baker, Anna Boyert, Savannah Camacho, Jennifer Celis, Dana Clancy, Amira Coleman, Danielle Coleman, Darby Crynes, Kaylee Dodd, Aurora Dybedokken, Stephanie Ferrante, Carly Flinn, Anna Gunter, Jillian Hagen, Kami Hankins, Abbie Hetherington, Hannah Harris, Emily Helms, Kaytlyn Larson, Kaci McCary, Maddie Molloy, Kaylee Oyler, Annelise Poss, Sarah Robinson, Briana Strahorn, Bailey Sutherlin, Ambra Wesley, Gintare Zenkeviciute