The regular indoor track and field season has ended, and the Vandals are headed to the Jackson Indoor Track in Nampa, for the WAC Indoor Championships. The four-day meet started Thursday and will conclude Saturday.
“Any championship that we go into, as far as the team, I’m just hoping that the kids perform as they’ve been performing,” Idaho coach Julie Taylor said. “We’re not expecting the kids to get a million (personal records). We’re just hoping that they continue to do what they’ve been doing all year. If they do that, they’ll do really well in our conference.”
Several Vandals have a chance at winning events if they perform like they have all season. A couple are in the men’s 400m dash. Freshman Ben Ayesu-Attah and sophomore Andrew Bloom are No. 4 and 5 in the WAC. After finishing as the top 400m collegiate runner last weekend at the Vandal Collegiate, Ayesu-Attah said he is prepared to perform well in the conference championships. He hopes to finish in the top three this weekend.
Juniors James Clark and Kyle Tylor form the Vandals’ one-two punch in the middle distance races. Clark and Tylor are No. 1 and 2 in the 800-meter going into the WAC Championships.
“Our middle distance runners are stacked both in the men’s and women’s,” Taylor said.
In the men’s mile, junior Barry Britt and senior Stephane Colle are ranked behind Utah State’s Chio Lopez. Britt holds the top time in the 3000-meter with Colle right behind him.
“Barry Britt has ran really well in the 5K as well as the 3K so we have high expectations for both of those races,” Taylor said.
Multi-event athlete Andrew Blaser is near the top of the WAC in many events. Taylor said the senior is the favorite to win the men’s heptathlon. Blaser is in the top two in the high jump and 60-meter hurdles and top five in the pole vault.
Blaser isn’t the only good pole-vaulter for the Vandals. Senior Jeremy Klas is competing for his third straight WAC Indoor individual title. If he succeeds, he will match Vandal legend Russ Winger as the only Vandal to win three individual WAC indoor titles. Winger’s titles came in the shot put in 2006-2008.
Sophomore Dylan Watts is right behind Klas in the men’s pole vault after a five-inch personal record at the Vandal Collegiate.
Triple jumper Rendel Jones and throwers Joseph Charles and Kyle Rothwell also have shots at individual titles for the Vandal men.
Taylor said Utah State is the men’s team to beat this year in the WAC while La. Tech will pose the greatest challenge for the women’s team.
Middle and long distance runners are the strength of Idaho’s women’s team. Junior Liga Velvere is No. 1 in the 800-meter — an event in which the Vandals could sweep the top four places.
“Liga Velvere ran amazing times, broke the school record in the (800-meter),” Taylor said. “She’ll be expected to run on both relays for us.”
Sophomore Hannah Kiser goes into the WAC Championships No. 1 in the mile and 3000-meter as well as No. 2 in the 800-meter. Kiser also qualified for nationals in the 3000-meter at the Flotrack Husky Classic in Seattle.
The Idaho men will try for their first conference title since the 1997 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation title. The Vandal women will try for their first indoor title since the Mountain West Athletic Conference win in 1983.
“I think we have a very very good team in both men and women,” Taylor said. “There’s not too many events that we don’t have people in it that are competitive.”
Stephan Wiebe can be reached at [email protected]