Powell Earns Pac-12 Coach Of The Year

SEATTLE – After leading Washington to its first outdoor conference track & field championship in 95 years, it’s little surprise that Head Coach Andy Powell has been named the Pac-12 Men’s Coach of the Year, as the conference announced its annual honors today.
 
The Husky men ended Oregon’s 15-year reign atop the conference, scoring a team record 151 points and winning seven individual titles, also a team record, at last weekend’s Pac-12 Championships held in Walnut, Calif. at Mt. San Antonio College. UW held off USC by 14 points for the victory.
 
Powell has overseen a steady rise to the top of the Pac-12 pecking order. Prior to Powell taking leadership, the Huskies were 8th at the 2018 Pac-12 meet. In his first season in 2019, the Huskies moved up to fourth. The next time the meet was held, in 2021, the Dawgs climbed to third, and they were runner-up in 2022 before getting the historic win this season.
 
Washington had never won any configuration of the Pac-8, Pac-10, or Pac-12, which dates back to 1960. The team had a few PCC Northern Division titles in the 1930s and 1940s and the last PCC team title that was not limited to the Northern Division came in 1928.
 
Powell directly oversees the men’s distance runners, and that group made history of its own, by becoming just the second men’s team ever to sweep the individual titles from 800-meters up. Sam Ellis won the 800-meters, Nathan Green won the 1,500-meters, Ed Trippas won the 3,000-meter steeplechase, and Brian Fay won both the 5,000-meters and the 10,000-meters,
 
Fay is just the second Husky ever to win the 5k and the 10k, and the first to do it in the same season. He is also the first men’s runner since Chris Derrick in 2010 to get the 5k/10k double victory at Pac-12s.
 
The 11th-ranked Husky men and the 19th-ranked Husky women will send 39 athletes on to the NCAA West Prelims next week in Sacramento, Calif. as they try to advance on to the NCAA Outdoor Championships in Austin, Texas.