Washington women’s track and field has 20 athletes competing at the NCAA West Preliminaries in Fayetteville, Arkansas, starting Wednesday.
Let’s meet the Huskies vying for bids to the NCAA Outdoor Championships in Eugene, Oregon.
Borton, a senior from Ohio who transferred to Washington in 2023 from Tennessee, sat out the 2025 season while recovering from injury. She finished 10th at the Big Ten Championships with a season-best clearance of 4.23m, her best result since the Don Kirby Invitational in February, and is seeded 26th in the field.
Cochran, who joined Washington from Arkansas in 2025, is one of three athletes who will compete at the Prelims in multiple events. The senior is seeded 17th in the 1500m with a qualifying time of 4:09.95 and 28th in the 5000m at 15:41.53. She finished 8th in the Big Ten final in the 1500m and was 16th in the 5000m two weekends ago.
Cosculluela has already punched her ticket to Eugene in the heptathlon, qualifying as the top seed in the 24-woman field after finishing sixth at the Outdoor Championships as a freshman last season. The Spaniard will get a warm-up in Fayetteville, where she is seeded 26th in the 100m hurdles with a time of 13.31.
A senior from Issaquah who competes internationally for France, David-Smith was 19th in the 5000m a season ago but is seeded 21st in the West with a time of 15:38.36. Her heat in Fayetteville includes freshman phenom Jane Hedengren of BYU, whose seed time is nearly 13 seconds faster than any other woman in the region.
A junior from Massachusetts, DeVeau did not compete until the 2025 cross country season while playing on the Huskies’ club rugby team and running with the school’s Husky Running Club. In her first season outdoors, DeVeau has broken through, however, and will head to Fayetteville as the 28th seed with a time of 33:18.23 in the 10000m.
One of the best athletes Washington is sending to Arkansas, Foerster is the No. 6 seed in the mile with a seed time of 4:08.64. No. 3 seed Carmen Alder of BYU is in Foerster’s heat, as are three athletes from Oregon (but not No. 2 seed Silan Ayyildiz, who is in Cochran’s heat).
The Moll twins are, unsurprisingly, seeded first and second, although Amanda is tied with South Dakota sophomore Anna Willis with seed clearances of 4.63m. Hana has had a stellar season as a junior, resetting the twins’ NCAA record multiple times and entering the week with a clearance two-tenths of a meter higher than any other woman. Both twins may only need to jump a few times before the field is whittled to the 12 who will head to Eugene.
Orange will likely need a slight improvement over her 52.93m season best to advance to Eugene, as she’s seeded 16th in a field that will only advance 12. The throws are one of the events where truly anything can happen; however, so don’t count the senior from Renton out.
Schroeder is Washington’s top qualifier in the javelin after winning the Big Ten title two weekends ago and will be seeded 11th with her best throw of 54.72m. Two Nebraska athletes – senior Jana Lowka and freshman Taysha Stubbs – have higher seed throws than Schroeder, so she enters as the third-ranked Big Ten athlete despite holding the crown.
Stiles was seeded 38th at last year’s NCAA West Prelims, but finished 21st in 35:00.21 in her first track season at UW after transferring in from Pennsylvania. Seeded 25th this year with a time of 33:07.79, it’s unlikely that she’ll outperform her seed by 17 places again, but she has an outside shot of making the team heading to Eugene.
A bronze medalist at the Canadian national championships in the 800m last year, Swartz is seeded 19th at 2:03.13 this week. She will be in the heat with the slowest leader, as No. 6 seed Juliette Whittaker of Stanford is the top seed in that first heat. Making the top 3 in that heat will likely be necessary to get into the quarterfinal, but Iowa junior Rosemary Arthur has the exact same seed time as Swartz to tie for the third-best seed coming into the heat.
A bronze medalist at the Canadian U20 national championships in the 800m last year, the younger Symon actually has the seed advantage over Swartz. She’s ranked 13th at 2:02.61 and hopes that being in the heat with No. 1 seed Sanu Jallow of Arkansas will pull her forward and add some time qualifying spots to her initial heat.
Washington has a lot of Canadians who took home bronze at last year’s national championships, evidently. Thomas wore that honor in the 5000m for Canada and will enter the week as the No. 14 seed in the West, only 2.09 seconds off the 12th-place cut line. She’ll have to do it alone, however, as Cochran and David-Smith are both in the other heat. Thomas has a better shot in the 10000m, where she is seeded 9th with a time of 32:19.59.
The 2019 German U20 javelin champion, Troeger transferred to Washington in 2025 from Cincinnati, where she redshirted in 2024 after an American Athletic Conference title in 2023. She brings up the rear of Washington’s trio in the event, seeded 24th with a best throw of 50.63m.
A highly decorated high school vaulter, true freshman Vacca has been relegated to the background while the Moll twins lay waste to the NCAA record book. But the Pennsylvania native has been very good in her own right with a best jump of 4.43m, which is tied for 12th – the cut mark for the event. She may need to win a jump-off to join the twins in Eugene.
A junior from Wisconsin who is a multi-event athlete by trade, Washburn is seeded 28th in the long jump with a leap of 6.30m after not qualifying for the heptathlon final in Eugene. On paper, she’d need to find 0.16m over her best to get in the top 12 and advance to the NCAA Championships.
Welin did not race in the 2025 outdoor season until May, but she’s found her stride this year as a steeplechaser. The junior from Illinois will enter the week as the 32nd seed of 48 qualifiers in the event with a time of 10:16.98. Her heat includes the No. 2 and No. 5 seed, so a fast race could pull her into contention for a spot in Eugene.
Wilson makes it five women in the pole vault prelims from Washington, as the junior from Duvall smashed her personal bests to qualify for her first NCAA Prelims. She was 7th at the Big Ten Championships and enters Fayetteville as the 42nd-ranked athlete with a best clearance of 4.13m.
This article originally appeared on Huskies Wire: Washington Huskies track & field sending 20 women to NCAA West Prelims
