The start of a special day began when Winny Koskei conquered wet and soggy conditions in New Orleans on Thursday morning to win the individual women’s cross country title at the American Athletic Conference Championships.
Rebekah Topham followed closely to give Wichita State two runners in the top three, then Winnie Kibet and Yazmine Wright kept pace with a pack of runners through the finish line. Finally, Rita Schnacker came striding through and held off four runners to secure a 26th-place finish.
No one knew the importance of what the Shockers had just accomplished until the scores were tallied up and it was revealed the WSU women’s team had stunned the rest of the conference by winning the AAC team title with 63 points, two ahead of Tulsa and four ahead of Temple.