Tight race puts GCU women 4th at WAC Indoors

Photo by: Garrett Ohrenberg

2/25/2023 11:57:00 PM | Track and Field

Lopes finish 1 point out of 2nd place, get Saturday wins by Archer, Christie-Galloway

By: Paul Coro

SPOKANE, Wash. — The Grand Canyon women's track and field team finished the WAC Indoor Track and Field Championships in fourth place, just one point behind Sam Houston's and New Mexico State's tie for second place.

The Lopes closed Saturday's action at The Podium with 82 points, highlighted by conference championship wins by junior Joanna Archer in the 800-meter run and junior Keira Christie-Galloway in the 60-meter hurdles.

Stephen F. Austin captured the women's indoor team title with 99.5 points.

"Our women's team battled all the way until the end," GCU head coach Tom Flood said after winning five of the previous six WAC women's indoor titles.

Joanna Archer

Archer and Christie-Galloway were dominant in their gold-medal performances. Archer, the Texas Tech transfer from Guyana, took the lead on the second lap, lengthened it on the third lap and used a final-stretch kick to win in 2 minutes, 11.27 seconds.

With senior Kelly Moodry in third and junior Stefana Purkovic in seventh, the Lopes scored 18 points in the 800.

Christie-Galloway won the 60-meter hurdles by a quarter-second, recording a time of 8.23 seconds to land 10 more points for GCU.

"Keira Christie-Galloway blew away the competition," Flood said.

Lopes senior Therese Olshanski's nine points in the 1-mile and 3,000-meter races were well earned. Olshanski is enrolled academically at two universities and as she is pursuing becoming a physician assistanst. She took third in the 1 mile, where Purkovic also took sixth, and sixth in the 3,000 with a school-record time of 9:48.85.

"Therese Olshanski had a great meet and is the epitome of the term student-athlete," Flood said.

GCU also picked up points on junior Katie Petsch's fifth-place finish in the 60, a third-place finish by the 1,600-meter relay team and junior Allysa Walls' seventh-place performance in the weight throw. Junior Camdyn Bruner and sophomore Amanda Thrue took sixth and seventh in the pentathlon to combine for five points.

Sophomores Taryn Burkett and Jazmine Scott were fourth and fifth in the triple jump for nine points after GCU already had landed eight points in the long jump Friday from junior Brooke Weimer. Junior Onome Ogbeni and senior Samaria McDonald also had added three points in the shot put on Friday, when junior Madison Ganthorp took seven in the pole vault.

WAC Women's Indoor Track and Field Championships final scoring
Rank	Team	Points
1.	Stephen F. Austin	99.5
2t.	Sam Houston	83
2t..	New Mexico State	83
4.	Grand Canyon	82
5.	Utah Valley	81.5
6t.	Southern Utah	59
6t.	Abilene Christian	59
8.	UT Arlington	47
9.	UT Rio Grande Valley	37
10.	Tarleton	21
11.	Seattle U	6
12.	Utah Tech	4