Blogs : John Wise

Season complete, summertime is here

Well I apologize for not writing much this spring in this blog.  Finding time to do it became near impossible in April and May but now my life has slowed down just a bit so I wanted to wrap up a few things as we head into the summer.

Our women defended their MVC crown with a tough win at Drake while our men finished 3rd, behind Northern Iowa and Indiana State.  I think our men are one year away from being a formidable challenger and next spring I think we will be in the hunt.  Our women have the bullseye on their backs and we are hoping our run of seven straight MVC titles (CC, Indoor, Outdoor) can be extended next fall, winter, and spring.

I have had a ball this year at Wichita State.  Being from Ohio and going to mostly east coast meets while I was at Kent State, I got the opportunity to see the Midwest and visit just about everywhere in the MVC and Big-12.  The trips are a little longer and there is a little more open space but the meets are just as good and the people are even better.

I have also enjoyed my job as recruiting coordinator and I think we have signed a nice class of newcomers for the 2007-08 season.  While the heart and soul of our team is from Kansas, we have begun to creep into other parts of the country as we signed kids from Oklahoma, Texas, Minnesota, Florida, and Michigan.  We've also had success with the local junior colleges (something new for me) and feel like our team has been strengthened.

Here is a quick summary of my first year at WSU ...

-Women's track team MVC triple crown (CC, Indoor, Outdoor) for 2nd straight year.

-Survived a year with Coach Rainbolt (see the two versions of 'a dude named rainbolt')

-Our basketball team started the year 9-0 and 9th in the national polls before lossinf 14 of their last 22.  Coach Turgeon left for Texas A&M after the season.

-I saw the worst day of weather in Texas Relays history.

-Our baseball team won the regional and is playing in the Super Regional this weekend in Wichita.

-Went to Cal-Berkeley (somewhat liberal) with a group of innonent midwestern college kids.

-We signed 25 recruits so far, may get up to 30 if we're lucky.

-Witnessed the Kansas state high school meet.  Six classes of guys and girls all at the same time!

-Saw a 4-year old kid almost get killed by a MVC 400m runner during the indoor championships.

-Got lost in Minnesota a dozen times in 3 days.

-Had quite a time at the San Antonio coaches' convention.

-Learned the history of the WU-Shock.

-And many, many, more than probably wouldn't be appropriate for this audience.

I hope everyone has a great summer.  We are still working hard in the track office getting ready to recruit a whole new batch of athletes in July and trying to figure out how to get the Shockers on the top of the MVC next year.  Good luck to everyone!

Untitled Comment

1:33 PM, September 4, 2007 .. Posted by Jordan Henning

Hey sounds like you had an eventful year John hope this year is just as fun for you as mine was for me.