Best Performance for Bengals in Years at Big Sky Conference Championships

Full Results - Men's 8K
Full Results - Women's 5K

Pocatello, ID - For a moment, at the Big Sky Cross Country Championships, there wasn't a Bengal with a dry eye in the house. A result was confirmed, and the emotions took over. 

More on that later, however, as there's a lot to unpack. 

On a crisp day in Pocatello, the Idaho State Bengals hosted the other nine teams of the illustrious Big Sky Conference for the championship meet. In his first season at the helm, coach Zach Kughn has stated that his main goal was to have his athletes "run with a purpose."

The purpose was clear: the Bengals had run with the best in the country, topping teams such as Cincinnati, Akron, Western Michigan, and more. They can compete and win in the Big Sky. As always, however, talk is cheap. It was time to go run.

The action had to wait, though, as some fresh frost on the ground delayed each race an hour. The starting gun finally fired for the men's race at noon, and the Bengals ran hard from the jump. Seth Babbel was the top finisher in the pack with a time of 24:28.4, 16th overall in the race. Just behind Babbel at 18th was fellow junior Sunny Gunn, clocked at 24:35.1. In their final conference meets, Brandon Walker and Cade Smith crossed the finish line 28th and 41st with times of 25:11.6 and 25:46.7, respectively.

Overall, the men's team raced to a fifth-place team finish in a performance that will go down as one of the best in recent memory. The last time the ISU men finished in the top half of the Big Sky was in 2018. A tightly packed group, the Bengal men finished with 143 total points. In a sport where the lowest score wins, this total is also the fewest since the '18 meet.

Knowing what his team is capable of, coach Kughn stated "It's rare that the team out-performs my high expectations, but we went out and executed what we had to do. Some other teams gave us opportunities, and because we were where we needed to be, we capitalized."

The day kept rolling for the Bengals after that, with the women kicking off the 5K at 1:00 p.m. Cassandra Vasquez led the orange and black with a 13th-place finish, clocked at 17:35.4. Next up was sophomore Olivia Kendell at 22nd with a time of 17:57.0. Alivia Johnson came next for ISU with a time of 18:14.3. Senior Sulette Ferreyra Serna and sophomore Allie Lemons wrapped up the top five with times of 18:26.7 and 18:30.8. Johnson, Kendell, and Lemons have had breakout sophomore campaigns, coming into the meet with three of the top twenty 5K times in the conference and have paved the way for the future. 

After the last runner crossed the finish line, the announcement came through. Idaho State's women's team placed fourth in the conference championships, the first top-half finish since 2014 and the first fourth-place or better since 2012. 

The realization hit the team quickly as they realized what they had accomplished. Not only had they had one of their best conference championships in over a decade, but jumped from ninth place in 2023 to fourth this year. There wasn't a dry eye in orange and black as the celebrations began, with even coach Kughn having a sentimental moment with his team. He made sure they knew how proud he was of them and that this result was the culmination of months of hard work they put in all season long.

"It just felt amazing. We were so proud of each other. We worked hard all season long, and we had set some goals for ourselves coming into this one, and it felt like we really came out and executed really well," remarked senior Cassandra Vasquez after the race. 

When asked about the mindset under the team's new head coach, Vasquez knew right away how the team felt. 

"We've felt more confident and fearless and I think that played a big part, just believing in each other. We all really love (Coach Kughn). He works us hard and he really believes in us." 

When asked about the runner who has improved the most throughout the year, both Vasquez and Kughn had the same response.

"Olivia Kendell for sure," remarked Vasquez. "I'm so proud of her, she's had so many PRs and has just done really well. I'm so excited to see where she goes from here." 

"Olivia Kendell, easy answer." said Kughn. "I am with her every day and I still don't know how she does it, it's so incredible. Look at her finish at the last conference meet compared to today."

To back up both their points, Kendell finished 59th in a race of 79 runners at the 2023 Big Sky meet in Missoula, improving that to 22nd out of 76 this past Friday. Additionally, her 5K time (17:57.0) improved by over a full minute and a half from last year (19:27.8).

Below are the team rankings from the Big Sky meet compared to the preseason polls.

 

From here, the Bengals are off to compete in the NCAA Mountain Regionals, hosted by the University of Nevada in Reno on Friday, November 15. The Mountain Region features member schools from multiple conferences including the Big 12, Mountain West, Conference USA, WAC, and a few select Big Sky schools.