Oregon’s Edward Cheserek has been named the Pac-12 Cross Country Men’s Athlete of the Year, the conference announced Wednesday afternoon. This is an unprecedented third-straight Athlete of the Year award for Cheserek.
Also honored were Colorado’s John Dressel as the Men’s Freshman of the Year, Stanford’s Aisling Cuffe as the Women’s Athlete of the Year, UCLA’s Carolina Johnson as the Women’s Freshman of the Year and Colorado’s Mark Wetmore as both the Men’s and Women’s Coach of the Year.
Cheserek is just the second person to be named the conference athlete of the year three times, following in the footsteps of Washington State’s Henry Rono, who claimed the award in 1976, 1977 and 1979. Unlike Rono, Cheserek was able to win his three honors in consecutive years.
This season has been impressive for the Oregon junior, as he also won the Pac-12 Cross Country title for the third time, joining Rono (1976, ’78-’79) and Oregon legend Steve Prefontaine (1970-71, ’73). Again, Cheserek is the only athlete to have done it in consecutive seasons.
Cheserek was placed on the Men’s All-Pac-12 first team, while sophomore teammate Travis Neuman made it to the second team.
For the Duck women sophomore Alli Cash and senior Waverly Neer were on the first team, while sophomore Frida Berge and senior Molly Grabill were named to the second team.
Follow Christopher Keizur on Twitter @chriskeizur