GCU men repeat as outdoor track and field champs

Thursday, May 12

Seattle, Wash.

Grand Canyon

WAC Outdoor Championships

Grand Canyon competes in the 2022 WAC Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Seattle, Washington.

Photo by: WAC

5/14/2022 8:58:00 PM | Track and Field

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Flood wins Coach of the Year; Okyere gets High Point Award, Outstanding Field Performer

By: Josh Hauser

SEATTLE — The Grand Canyon track and field program continually adds to its trophy case, taking home the WAC Outdoor Track and Field Championships title on the men's side on Saturday night.

"Our sport is called track and field, and our field events definitely carried us this weekend," Lopes head coach Tom Flood said. "Any conference championship is hard to win but it is even more difficult to repeat. "

Lopes head coach Tom Flood was named WAC Coach of the Year and senior Jorden Okyere was the High Point Award winner and the Outstanding Field Performer.

"It's part of the culture at GCU," Okyere said of winning another WAC title. "We like to win these conference championships for sure. We just had to put our heads down, keep working and come do what we are supposed to do."

GCU has won eight WAC outdoor championships with the men repeating this year for their fourth title, matching the women's total of four.

Okyere won the hammer throw on Thursday and the shot put on Friday. His mark of 17.26 meters in the shot put set a school record. His throw of 59.69 meters in the hammer was more than a meter better than the field.

"It felt good," Okyere said. "I've been working real hard this year and it hasn't been the best year, but it was nice to get a little recognition toward the end there. It was a fun meet. Very happy with it. Obviously, there's more in the tank that I wish came out, but it did the job for the team. Can't be mad at that."

#WACotf | @GCU_TrackXC Jorden Okyere is the Men's Outstanding Field Performer of the Championship! He talks about his performance in Seattle with Matt Baiamonte! pic.twitter.com/iQScff66gc
— The Western Athletic Conference (@WACsports) May 15, 2022

On the women's side, the Lopes placed fourth in the 12-team field, just one point behind third-place Utah Valley.

"While I liked the way we battled all weekend, we were already a little snake bit coming into the meet, missing two very talented athletes," Flood said. "We just seemed to struggle to find our rhythm all weekend long with the bad weather."

GCU had the top two finishers in the men's decathlon in junior Aidan Diggs and sophomore Jorg Vanlierde. Diggs scored 6,902 points by winning the 100- and 400-meter runs and the 110-meter hurdles while also finishing second in the long jump. Vanlierde was 10 points behind Diggs after winning the discus and the pole vault and finishing second in the shot put.

"It was great to see Aidan Diggs repeat as WAC champion in the decathlon and Aidan, Jorg Vanlierde and Patrick Nelson combine to score 21 points in the event," Flood said.

Sophomore Gabriel Binion won a pair of events in the long jump (7.53 meters) and the triple jump (14.74 meters).

"It was great to see both Jorden (hammer throw and shot put) and Gabe (long and triple jump) pull off being double-event conference champions," Flood said.

Senior Jacob Lewis added to his career accolades by winning the 1,500-meter run with a time of 3 minutes, 47.96 seconds.

"Jacob Lewis defended his 1,500m championship and Joseph Skoog picked up an additional three points by finishing sixth," Flood said. "I also thought Kyle DeMocia and David Kolar had excellent weekends in the sprint events."

Junior Marten Gasparini won the javelin with a throw of 67.74 meters.

"Our javelin crew also scored 15 points with Marten Gasparini winning the event and Patrick finishing fourth," Flood noted. "Our men's discus squad also produced some great performances, including Karsten Santaella's runner-up finish with a school-record distance of 54.02 meters and Deshon Toney and Jorden adding 12 points to our team total."

For GCU's women, fifth-year Alexa Hokanson won the title in the 800-meter run, finishing in 2:05.14.

Hokanson was also a member of GCU's 1,600-meter relay that ended the meet on a positive note, claiming the title with a time of 3:45.15.

"We did finish the meet with several outstanding performances from Alexa Hokanson repeating as 800 meter champion," Flood said. "We also had a nice 2/3 finish in the triple jump from a couple of freshman athletes in Taryn Burkett and Jazmine Scott. We finished the meet very well by winning the 4x400 meter relay with Dora Filipovic, Kelly Moodry, Alexa and Anaya Bailey."

The Lopes will have two weeks before sending athletes to the NCAA West Regionals in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

"We will take a couple days of when we get home before we start to prepare for the NCAA West Regional in Fayetteville in two weeks," Flood said.