UW women's track coach Jim Stintzi held a press conference Monday to discuss the upcoming Big Ten Outdoor Championships which will be held this weekend in College Park, Pa.
The women's squad will be looking to win its first Big Ten outdoor title since its back-to-back titles in 1996 and 1997. Coming into this competition the team will be slightly undermanned.
""We're excited to be heading into the Big Ten Championships, as usual. We are, as we were indoors, a little shorthanded,"" Stintzi said. ""We're still missing the services of Blair Luethmers, Big Ten champ, and Katrina Rundhaug, Big Ten champ, and a couple others that had scored pretty highly last year. But we've had some exciting things happen this spring.""
Junior Kayla Schultz broke the school discus record and has been progressing well in the disc, shot put and javelin.
""[Schultz] definitely has progressed every year. She's a junior right now and she threw reasonably well for a freshman, scored last year in the [discus]. But [she] has really come along this year,"" Stintzi said. ""Indoors, she had a big PR at the Big Ten meet in the shot put, and has just come along sort of light years in the discus.""
The third-year coach, however, expressed concern about the future of the team if it continued to focus solely on in-state athletes.
""I think we have to go outside of the state. Is Wisconsin a solid state for a base of recruiting? Yeah, I think it is. But I think we do have to do a better job of getting at least outside of Wisconsin into the rest of the Big Ten and we've made some inroads. But I think we can do better,"" Stintzi said.
""I think it'll be difficult to be the kind of sprint powerhouse that we want to be and we think we can be with coach Guthrie if we just stay in-state. Now if I say that, I don't mean to insult the state of Wisconsin and the track talent, but I think one state can't be as good as 49 other states combined.""
The Badgers reorganized significant parts of their coaching staff last off-season adding Mark Guthrie and shifting the responsibilities of different assistant coaches. Those shifts resulted in a sixth place finish in the Big Ten indoor meet and a 34th place finish in the national indoor championships. Stintzi felt that these changes have upgraded the play of his team.
""We're not quite at the regional level yet, but I think we have a really good shot of doing that at the Big Ten meet. I wouldn't be surprised if we qualify for a 4 x 400, which going into this year I didn't think was possible. So that's been great,"" Stinzi said. ""Coach Wabaunsee, last year when the men were short staffed, worked with them in the throws and the vault, and that's stayed the same. I'm excited about long-term possibilities for the configuration of the staff.""
Minnesota won last season's conference outdoor championship but no team has repeated since the 2003-2004 season.
