UNM TRACK & FIELD
UNM eyeing elusive team title sweep at Mountain West championships
Lobo women also looking to win back-to-back team titles
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When Darren Gauson was hired at New Mexico in 2023, the plan was clear.
“I remember saying to (former athletic director Eddie Nuñez), ‘I want to be good in all six sports: (men’s and women’s) cross country, indoor and outdoor (track and field),’” Gauson, UNM’s third-year track and field coach, said Tuesday.
“‘It’s great winning cross country, but there’s still four other championships. And we’re going to build around a strong distance program as our core, and then attempt to build up other areas of the program.’”
This weekend might be the biggest test of that plan yet.
With 11 top seeds across both teams, New Mexico men’s and women’s track and field is set to compete for an elusive team title sweep this week at the Mountain West Indoor Track and Field Championships (Feb. 26-28) in Reno, Nevada.
While UNM’s women’s team won last year’s indoor league title, the Lobo men have not done so since 2015 — the last time both teams claimed indoor titles in the same meet. Achieving an indoor title sweep would be a clear sign of Gauson’s plan coming to fruition, and UNM’s “emergence as a full track program,” as he called it.
“I think you’re just seeing us emerge in the jump events with (Ajia Hughes) and our pole vaulters are doing well,” Gauson added. “Our sprinters are doing great — (Brodie Young) and (Rebecca Grieve) are right there, ranked top 20 in the country … We’re a lot stronger, just overall, as a program.”
Of course, both the Lobos’ men’s and women’s teams will still be anchored by their distance runners. Despite racing sparingly this indoor season, Habtom Samuel and Pamela Kosgei remain heavy favorites to repeat for league titles in the 3,000- and 5,000-meter finals at Reno-Sparks Convention Center.
Including two races at the Millrose Games in New York, Samuel has only raced indoors four times this year. But even with a smaller sample size, UNM’s star junior holds the best 5k time in the country at 13 minutes and 5.21 seconds, a mark set at the BU Sharon Colyear-Danville Season Opener in December.
“He’s just looking really good right now, probably a lot stronger than last year,” Gauson said. “It’s obviously a great conference, he’s got some teammates to compete against, but we’re really focused on that national championship and using Mountain West (indoors) as a stepping stone to that.”
Kosgei, the reigning NCAA champ in the outdoor 5k and 10k, has raced even less after taking a break following a busy 2025.
“She was running on fumes a little bit with a long 2025 … I think we’re really just starting to make big strides in practice,” Gauson said. “Again, the goal is just for her to be at her best in Arkansas at (NCAA) indoor nationals. We’re hoping we got the timing right there.”
While the Lobo women remain a heavy favorite to win another team title, Gauson said he expects a tighter affair in the men’s standings. UNM narrowly lost the men’s team title to Colorado State last season, falling by just four points in one of the closest meets in nearly a decade.
“I think we’re a little stronger this year,” Gauson added. “I have us tied on points at the moment. So a successful meet for us would be winning both championships … It’s almost an expectation that we win the women’s (title).
“ … The goal is to win. We don’t want to lose anything. We'll leave it all out there and try and win both (titles) this weekend."
Sean Reider covers college football and other sports for the Journal. You can reach him at sreider@abqjournal.com or via X at @lenaweereider.
