Bob Hogue's Commissioner's Corner highlights outstanding fall campaign for The PacWest

By PacWest Commissioner Bob Hogue

Each year, the PacWest Men’s and Women’s Cross Country Championships perfectly reflect the great diversity and incredible beauty of the Pacific West Conference. This week’s championship races, hosted by Grand Canyon University at Estrella Mountain Regional Park in Goodyear, AZ, on Oct. 29, are another example of the diverse locations that our top runners have competed at during the past several years.

Over the last five years, our cross country student-athletes have participated in beautiful championship venues on the Big Island of Hawai‘i (hosted by UH Hilo in 2006), in the hills of the San Francisco Bay peninsula in Belmont, CA (hosted by Notre Dame de Namur in 2007), along the ocean front at Turtle Bay, HI (hosted by BYU-Hawaii and Chaminade in 2008 and 2010), and in the lush greenery of Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, CA (hosted by Academy of Art in 2009). This week’s venue will give our runners a taste of the beauty and grandeur of the Southwest Desert.

Our student-athletes are incredibly fortunate. No other conference in any division of the NCAA has such beautiful and varied locations. That’s what makes the PacWest so unique.

But as unique and diverse as we are, we are also tremendously competitive. The cross country races feature three phenomenal runners from Kenya - two-time PacWest Champion Amos Maru and Daveson Marandich of Academy of Art, and Kip Mutai of Grand Canyon. All three runners should be top contenders for the men’s individual crown this weekend. BYU-Hawaii is the defending men’s team champion.

Lacey Krout of BYU-Hawaii leads the Seasider women’s team in defense of its title, but BYU-Hawaii expects a tremendous test from conference newcomer California Baptist and others.

Besides cross country, the other PacWest sports competing this fall reflect a huge leap in competitiveness. For the first time ever, a vast majority of our teams have winning records in all three of the fall team sports - men’s and women’s soccer and women’s volleyball.

In men’s soccer, Grand Canyon, California Baptist, Hawai‘i Pacific, Dixie State, Notre Dame de Namur and BYU-Hawaii have all had banner seasons. In women’s soccer, six more programs have put together outstanding winning campaigns - California Baptist, BYU-Hawaii, Grand Canyon, Hawai‘i Pacific, Dixie State and Notre Dame de Namur.

The soccer titles won’t be earned until the final kicks of the regular season the first week of November - with the hope that a couple of our teams will advance to the NCAA Division II West Regional.

Then, in women’s volleyball, its been an incredibly spirited chase for the title from conference championship contenders BYU-Hawaii, Grand Canyon, Hawai‘i Pacific, Dixie State, California Baptist and Hawai‘i Hilo - all of whom have pushed each other to the limit over and over again this fall. The strength of schedule of our conference has risen significantly as a result and we should be able to make some noise in the NCAA II Tournament in mid-November.

The PacWest is truly making a name for itself. It’s reflected on the court and on the field, and also in the classroom and the community. I was proud to hand out the PacWest Academic Achievement Award to Dominican University of California in San Rafael this fall, as well as one of the conference Community Engagement Awards to Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, CA.

I will be in St. George, Utah, to give the other Community Engagement Award to Dixie State in early December. I also will be in Phoenix to honor Grand Canyon University for winning the first conference Make-A-Wish Award.

Congratulations also should be noted for BYU-Hawaii’s Elwen Li for being named one of the nine finalists for NCAA Woman of the Year.  

In November, Chaminade will be featured on national television in the Maui Invitational and our basketball teams will try to repeat the outstanding performances of last year when we placed an unprecedented five men’s and women’s teams in the NCAA II Tournament. Also last season, the PacWest boasted a national runner-up (BYU-Hawaii) and Elite Eight Most Outstanding Player (Jet Chang of BYU-Hawaii) in men’s basketball, and a women’s basketball National Player of the Year (Samantha Murphy of Grand Canyon).

Without a doubt, it’s a proud time to say, “We are the PacWest!”