ARLINGTON, Texas – Tarleton State’s Kevin Baez and UT Arlington’s Matro Jepkemboi have been named the TicketSmarter Western Athletic Conference (WAC) Cross Country Athletes of the Week, for the week ending on Saturday, Sept. 16.
 
In his first meet of the year, Baez (Sr.) recorded a second-place podium finish in the Texas A&M Invitational with an 8K time of 24:09.8, a personal best. Baez was able to outrun 131 competitors from some of the top teams in the South Central Region such as #4 Texas A&M, #8 Houston, #10 UT Arlington, and #11 TCU. Baez was one of three Texans to place in the top-20 in the meet, leading the team to a fifth-place finish.
 
In the span of a week, Jepkemboi (Fr.) made her Mavericks debut and collected a pair of second-place finishes. The athlete from Kenya recorded her first podium finish with a 17:22.2 5K time in the Gerald Richey UTA Invitational on Saturday, September 9^th. Jepkemboi grabbed second place by eight seconds and held off runners from ranked South Central teams #6 SMU and #8 TCU. Jepkemboi was one of three UTA top-ten finishers which contributed to a second-place team finish.
 
Six days later, Jepkemboi matched her result with another second-place finish, this time in the Texas A&M invitational. Her 5K time of 17:24.2 was good enough to beat the third-place runner by another respectable margin of seven seconds. This meet consisted of 115 total competitors, including runners from #5 Texas A&M, #8 TCU, and #12 Houston. UTA is now ranked #7 in the South Central Region as no Maverick placed below 55^th in the meet. Jepkemboi was once again one of three UTA top-ten finishers as the team placed third.
 
2023 TicketSmarter WAC Cross Country Weekly Awards
 
MEN’S ATHLETES OF THE WEEK
Kevin Baez, Sr., Tarleton State (Sept. 20)
Rikus Van Niekerk, Jr., California Baptist (Sept. 6)
 
WOMEN’S ATHLETES OF THE WEEK
Matro Jepkemboi, Fr., UT Arlington (Sept. 20)
Morgan Nokes, Jr., Utah Valley (Sept. 6)