BYU, USU men win conference titles; T-Birds sweep

The BYU men and Colorado State women captured the 2007 Mountain West Conference cross country championships in Albuquerque, N.M., on Saturday.

The BYU men captured their eighth championship crown in seven years with 46 team points, placing all five scoring runners in the top 20. New Mexico finished second, just one point ahead of third-place Air Force.

"We had some guys step up today," said BYU coach Ed Eyestone, who was named 2007 MWC men's coach of the year. "I lost my top guy (Stephan Shay) when we had to pull him at the 5K mark for a chronic back injury, so my eighth and ninth guys ended up stepping up and finished fourth and fifth for us.

"It's a team sport and a lot of times we think running is individual, but today was a team effort and we had some guys step up. We're just overall happy to end up taking the conference championship."

New Mexico senior Jeremy Johnson took the men's individual title, finishing the 8K leg in 24:23, nearly 25 seconds faster than the rest of the field. Senior Dustin Bybee, who has placed in the top 10 at the conference championship all four years of his collegiate career, led the Cougars to their 2007 title, coming in third at 24:55. Senior Chandler Goodwin was fifth (25:00) and sophomore Tyrel Jensen placed seventh (25:03).

After being runners-up to BYU for seven out of the past eight years, Colorado State won its first MWC title. The Cougars placed second with 39 points, followed by New Mexico (94), Wyoming (118), Utah (130), Air Force (160), UNLV (204), TCU (224) and San Diego State (229).

"It will happen sometime to everyone," said BYU women's coach Patrick Shane about the end of the Cougars' 19-year run as conference champions. "I'm not happy about it, but I am happy about how our athletes put it all on the line. Hats off to Colorado State."

BYU sophomore Katie Bowen (21:28) and freshman Angela Wagner (21:33) finished third and fourth, respectively.

Alyssa Abbott led Utah, finishing in 20th place at 22:37.

WAC: At Logan, Utah State's men's team won its third straight Western Athletic Conference championship, while the Aggie women placed third at American West Heritage Center.

"I'm proud of the way we performed today," said Utah State head coach Gregg Gensel. "It's always fun to watch these kids perform well, and the results are that they win."