Youth and inexperience showed through Friday at the Big 12 Championships as the men’s team finished sixth and the women’s team finished ninth overall in the conference.

The men were led by freshman Kiel Uhl, who placed seventh out of 98 athletes with a time of 25:06 in the 8K.

Men’s coach Corey Ihmels had hoped for a fourth or fifth place team finish and was disappointed.

“The top four [teams] were nationally ranked,” Ihmels said. “I don’t know if we could have been fourth but we could have been fifth. Kiel Uhl was tremendous, but our three, four, five guys really struggled.”

Ihmels believes Uhl could become something special before he’s done at Iowa State.

“Obviously he’s got to keep improving day-in and day-out and live the life of a distance runner 24-7, but the sky’s the limit,” he said. “If he wants to be great, he can.”

With more than half of the team newcomers like Uhl, the inexperience did make a difference.

“I hate to use that as an excuse because we didn’t do as well as we wanted to,” Ihmels said. “Now the guys all have the Big 12 meet under their belt and next time, it shouldn’t be anything they hadn’t encountered before.

“A positive is that it really showed the young guys what it takes to be a highly competitive team in the Big 12. It opened some of their eyes. Everybody on the team walked away with a better understanding of what that is. Now we need to be moving forward.”

On the women’s side of the track, freshman Lisa Koll placed 27th out of 99 competitors in the 6K race with a time of 21:59. Behind her was sophomore Teresa Booth in 61st with a time of 23.22.

Women’s coach Dick Lee said ninth place is about where he thought the team would finish.

“Realistically, I thought if we ran a really good race among our top five, and if somebody in the top six [teams] faltered, [a team] in the seventh or eighth spot could move up to sixth,” he said. “But it’s where I thought we’d finish.”

Lee said the team left the course disappointed, feeling they could have run better. Even Koll, the only runner to finish in the top 50 for the Cyclones, felt she could have placed closer to the top 20.

Lee said it’s hard to predict how good Koll could be at Iowa State, but that she has done a great job for a freshman.

“She’s run much better at the collegiate level than she did at the high school level,” he said. “She’s beating people [now] that beat her in high school at times. She could definitely be a national qualifier in the next two years.

“We hope to have a team in the national hunt in the next two years, as well.”

The women faced the adversity of inexperience just as the men’s team did.

“The Big 12 is a different experience than any other meet,” Lee said. “Not having the numbers depth-wise [in terms of competitors] but the depth of talent is very good. There are three or four ranked teams out of 12. There’s more riding on this meet than at the invites. We tell the freshmen, ‘It’s kind of like being at the state meet for the first time.’

“You just have to grow through that experience.”

As a team, the women moved up a spot from last season. Another positive Lee saw was that the runners didn’t give up when it was obvious they’d finish closer to the back of the conference.

“When you realize midway through the race [that you’re not doing well], you’ve got a choice – you can fight your way through it or bag it and quit competing,” he said.

“Our kids kept competing. If they bagged it, we’d have finished 11th or 12th and they didn’t do that.

“Hopefully, this is a stepping stone to get us into the top six for next year.”