After a Southern Stampede for both the men’s and women’s cross country teams, they are again preparing to compete in a Division-I hosted meet.

The Oklahoma State Jamboree will be held in Stillwater tomorrow.

“We’re gonna run the University division, which is what the bigger universities run,” said Women’s Head Coach Patty Vavra. “So we’ll get to compete against a lot of Division-I and some of the better Division-II schools. It’ll be the most competitive meet we’ve been in and will be a really great experience for us.”

Earlier in the year, the Lions’ cross country teams traveled to Arkansas to face the Razorbacks, who are the only team that has beaten the Lions women’s team this season.

The Stampede is one of the largest meets in the country every year, with approximately 2,000 runners.

The meet featured, as always, collegiate athletes, men and women, as well as high school runners, male and female, varsity and junior varsity.

“We had I think 64 high schools that were represented and about 50 colleges,” Vavra said. “It’s a major event. It’s definitely an event that brings a lot of people to Missouri Southern. I think we give them a great impression. It’s definitely known to be one of the places you wanna come if you’re looking for a great cross country meet.”

According to Men’s Head Coach Tom Rutledge, the event brings approximately $500,000 to the city of Joplin annually.

Both the Lions’ men and women finished high at the Stampede. The women were the top Division-II team, placing behind only the Arkansas Razorbacks. The men finished fourth with a team time of less than a minute behind the second-place Pittsburg State Gorillas and not even six seconds behind Southwest Baptist University.

“Its such a great event,” Vavra said. “You can’t really explain it. The term ‘stampede’ probably best describes it. When there’s 500-600 runners on the starting line all taking off at the same time, it’s a pretty impressive event.”

Tomorrow’s running of the Jamboree will be the 73rd in history.

The women in competition will run a 5,000 meter course and the men 8,000 meters.