MONMOUTH, Ill. – The numbers don’t lie. Monmouth College has dominated the Midwest Conference outdoor track meet for the last two decades.

Since 1990, the Fighting Scots men have won 14 of the 18 meets. The women have claimed more than half the meets, winning 11 of the 18. Given the MWC rankings, both teams could pick up more team hardware at this weekend’s meet at Knox College in Galesburg.

The Scots men have turned in the conference’s top-ranked performances in 12 of the 20 events and average nearly two-and-a-half performances in the top eight of each event. The women have 10 top-ranked performances of the 20 events and appear to be especially strong in the four throwing events where they have 17 top eight performances. Still, Roger Haynes, now in his 25th year guiding the Monmouth track program, is cautious when predicting the outcome of the 2008 meet.

"We still have some decisions to be made in regard to who we put in what events and how we try to combine some of our sprint and distance runners," reported Haynes. "We’ll work hard on that this week and set our order and schedule of events. We obviously have to figure out what the other teams are doing and go from there."

The Scots, who expect serious challenges from the Carroll and Illinois College men and Carroll and St. Norbert’s women, return defending conference champions in seven men’s and six women’s events. Defending outdoor national pole vault champion Peter Sprecher could join an elite group of Scots to win four conference titles in the same event, but he will be pressed by teammate and indoor national champion Jonny Henkins. Zach Wilson, Luke Reschke, Jessica White and Shannon Turczyn will be going after their third outdoor titles in the men’s hammer throw, men’s 400-meters, women’s pole vault and women’s 100-meter hurdles, respectively. Other defending conference champions include Clay Staley (10,000-), Brad Gross (400- hurdles), Megan Clennon (high jump), Tanesha Hughes (discus), Katie Vaccarello (400- hurdles), the women’s 4x100 relay and the men’s 4x100 and 4x400 relays.

Sprecher has the conference’s best mark in the pole vault (17’4-1/2) by nearly four inches over Henkins. Reschke, who holds the MWC’s top time in both the 200- (21.91) and 400- (48.78) , is expected to also see action on the relays where Gross could become a four-time winner in the 4x100 relay. Wilson has the league’s best marks in the shot put (49’6-1/2) and discus (162’9), but is second in the hammer throw (177’6). Teammate Sam Cokinos is ranked second behind Wilson in the shot put (49’1-3/4).

White has the top conference mark among the women’s pole vaulters (12’5-1/2). Turczyn leads the league in both the 100- hurdles (14.29) and the 100-meters (12.64).

The women could pick up major points in the throwing events where the Scots have five of the top six performances in the discus. Hughes has the conference’s best discus mark (152’9), followed by Jenny Babos, Allison Renfroe and Gloria Lehr at one through four and Samantha Bleyaert rounds out the group in sixth. Babos is ranked No. 1 in the shot put (43’7-3/4) and hammer throw (149’8). Hughes is second in the shot and third in the hammer, followed by Lehr, fourth in the shot and fifth in the hammer and Renfroe, sixth in both the shot and hammer. Clennon has the top ranking in the javelin (126’0) where Lehr is third, Cassie Jensen, fifth and Heather Hull, seventh.

After more than 20 years coaching track, Haynes has his practice plan in place. "We’ll have one hard workout this week and then get rested and recovered for Friday and Saturday," he reported. "I feel better about the conference meet now that it’s here. We’ve done all the training and preparation we can do, so there’s really not a whole lot to do other than run the meet. It’s time now for the kids to write some checks on their account they’ve put into with all the training they’ve done."

If history is any indication, expect the Scots to write a big check.