ST. LOUIS - After running her second school-record-breaking time in as many meets, (RV) William Woods University's Mekayla Gibson earned her third American Midwest Conference Women's Cross Country Runner of the Week award this season. Announced by the AMC Monday, Gibson was the Week 9 (Oct. 21-27) winner, and fellow WWU school-record shatterer Jenson Starr was named AMC Men's Cross Country Runner of the Week to make it an Owls sweep of the conference's weekly cross country accolades.

Gibson was selected for the weekly accolade by a committee of athletic communications professionals throughout the conference from a pool of nominees submitted by each school.

After breaking William Woods' women's 5k record for the first time in the Owls' previous competition, Gibson set WWU's women's 6k record - the team's first 6k event this season -  for the second time in her career, with a time of 21:59.23, 2.37 seconds better than her first school-record time. Competing against 27 of the NAIA's best teams in the Midwest, Gibson placed sixth out of 303 runners -top placer for a runner that wasn't on the top two teams, first-place No. 3 University of St. Mary and second-place, No. 5 The College of Idaho - in the Blazing Tiger NAIA Classic with that record-breaking time on Saturday at Mahoney State Park in Ashland, Neb.

Thanks to Gibson's and Starr's spectacular showings on Saturday, the Owls won both AMC cross country runner of the week awards for the first time since Week 5 of 2022. That week, Ellie Dimond received women's runner of the week, and Landon Dunlap took home men's runner of the week.

AMC Women's Runner of the Week nominees: Mia Duncan, Missouri Baptist University; Gibson Wiliam Woods.

AMC Men's Runner of the Week nominee: Starr, William Woods.

2024 AMC Cross Country Runners of the Week (Women; Men)
Week 1 (Sep. 2): Gibson (Wililam Woods); Oscar Curry (Columbia College)
Week 2 (Sep. 9): Madalenn Fee (Cottey College); Chris Palmer (Central Baptist College)
Week 3 (Sep. 16): N/A
Week 4 (Sep. 23): Gibson (William Woods); Will Cherrington (Columbia)
Week 5 (Sep. 30): Fee (Cottey); Palmer (Central Baptist)
Week 6 (Oct. 7): Duncan (Missouri Baptist); N/A
Week 7 (Oct. 14): Fee (Cottey); Starr (William Woods)
Week 8 (Oct. 21): Aletta Jonker (Williams Baptist University); N/A
Week 9 (Oct. 29): Gibson (William Woods); Starr (William Woods)