| Steven Brown | P.J. McGowen | Aaron Fox |
FRISCO ? Ten days after winning its third consecutive Southland Conference Indoor Championship, the UTSA men's track & field team added to its collection of hardware on Monday, as senior sprinter/jumper Steven Brown, freshman high jumper P.J. McGowen and Aaron Fox were named SLC Indoor Athlete of the Year, Freshman of the Year and Coach of the Year, respectively, as announced by the league office.
Brown ? who won the 200 meters, placed second in the long jump and finished third in the 60 meters ? tallied 24 points at this year's league meet and was the event's high-point scorer. His total was the most since former Roadrunners All-American Justin Youngblood netted 30 at the 2002 SLC Indoor Championships. The Mesquite native is just the second UTSA athlete to earn the conference's top individual award (Youngblood, 2004). Earlier this season, he broke Youngblood's seven-year old school record (24-6?/7.48m) in the long jump when he leaped 24-6 ? (7.49m) at the Blue & Orange Classic on Jan. 26.
Meanwhile, McGowen continued his stellar first season in navy blue and orange when he led three Roadrunners who combined to score 19 points with his first-place performance in the high jump. The Dayton native cleared an NCAA provisional 7-1 (2.16m) to become the second high jump champion in school annals and he tied Youngblood's school record set in 2002 in the process. He is the first athlete to earn the league's top award for first-year performers. McGowen currently ranks 18th on the national leaderboard and is on thefringe of being invited to next weekend's national indoor meet.
Fox collected his third consecutive honor after leading his squad to a three-peat.Behind individual titles from an SLC-record six athletes ? Brown, senior Luke Johnson (shot put), McGowen, sophomore Teddy Williams (60 meters), junior Tommy Wolfe (heptathlon) and senior Will Vese (60-meterhurdles), UTSA successfully defended its title by scoring a school-record 122 points toeasily outdistance Stephen F. Austin, which scored 101.5. The sixth-year head coach (eight years at UTSA overall) now has mentored 16 of the program's 40 individual league champions.
The Roadrunners continue their wait to see if NCAA provisional qualifiers McGowen, Williams and Vese earn invitations to the NCAA Indoor Championships, which begin on Friday, March 15, in Fayetteville, Ark.