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Five MWC student-athletes crowned national champions at NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships
Three women and two men earn titles
June 13, 2005 SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Five Mountain West Conference student-athletes were crowned national champions at the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, held at Sacramento State University's Hornet Stadium, June 8-11. For the women, Air Force's Dana Pounds won the javelin title, Colorado State's Loree Smith won the hammer, while Wyoming's Shauna Smith won the 400-meter hurdles. On the men's side, BYU had two champions as Rodrigo Mendes won the triple jump crown and Robison Pratt triumphed in the pole vault. Pounds' heave of 185'-4.00" in the javelin was 16 feet better than the runner-up in the event, while Smith ran a Mountain West Conference and University of Wyoming record time of 54.32 to win the 400-meter hurdles. Smith's throw of 224'-8.00" in the hammer was shy of her NCAA and MWC record mark of 229'-9.00" at last month's conference championships, but was nearly six feet better than the second-place finisher. Mendes won the triple jump by just a half an inch with a MWC record leap of 55'-11.00". Pratt won the pole vault by four inches with a mark of 18'-0.50". The five NCAA champions from the MWC was the fourth-most from a single conference. The Big 12 had 10 champions, the SEC had nine, while the Pac-10 had eight, followed by the MWC. In the team standings, BYU's men's team finished fourth with 34 points, while the Ram men were 67th with one point. For the women, BYU was 10th with 22 points, Wyoming was 18th with 12 points, Colorado State was 22nd with 11 points, Air Force was 24th with 10 points, San Diego State was 29th with nine points and UNLV was 47th with five points.
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