HOUSTON - Hawai`i more than doubled its team total from a year ago at the 2004 Western Athletic Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships at the Rice Track/Soccer Stadium today.

UH discus thrower Novelle Murray successfully defended her league crown in the event with a personal best toss of 49.91m (163-09). The sophomore picked up 10 points by winning the gold for the second straight year.

The top point totaler for UH was freshman Kelly Young who accumulated 13 points today in both the 800m and 1500m runs.

Young placed second overall in the 1500m run with a new school record time of four minutes and 28.75 seconds, which was also her third NCAA West Regional qualifying event this spring. She has qualified for the 400m hurdles and 800m run prior to today. She also picked up five points in the 800m run (2:07.48) capturing fourth overall just missing her UH own record by 1/100th of a second.

Dana Buchanan was the only other individual scorer for UH today picking up five points as she captured fourth in the 1500m run (4:31.11).

The UH relay teams notched three more points as the 4x100 team (50.17) was eighth and the 4x400 squad (3:52.88) was seventh.

Rice won the women's title with 161.50 points followed by Louisiana Tech (155), Nevada (128.50), Boise State (91), Fresno State (68), UTEP (67), Tulsa (63), SMU (48), and Hawai`i (34). Last year, UH totaled only 14 points at the WAC Championships.