UVU track: men, women indoor track picked to win GWC

NAPERVILLE, Ill. — The Great West Conference track coaches have selected Utah Valley University as the favorite to repeat as both the men's and women's 2013 GWC indoor track & field champions, the conference office announced Thursday.

Utah Valley, which won its first men's and women's indoor titles last season after finishing as runner-up the previous three years, was a unanimous choice among the coaches with all five first-place votes on both the men's and women's side.

Houston Baptist finished second to the Wolverines in both polls with the Huskies tallying 18 points in the men's balloting and 19 points in the women's. Texas-Pan American was third in both polls with 15 points for the Broncs in the men's ranking and 16 points for the Bronc women.

NJIT finished with nine points for fourth place in the men's poll, while Chicago State followed closely with eight points. Rounding out the women's poll was Chicago State in fourth place with nine points, while NJIT garnered six points.

The 2013 GWC indoor track and field champions will be determined Feb. 23-24 when Houston Baptist hosts the conference meet at Houston.

Jay Hinton is a sports information assistant at Utah Valley University.