Meet Preview: 2024 Bulldog Early Bird Meet

By Jacob Knabel on Dec. 11, 2024 in Track & Field

SEWARD, Neb. – The 2024-25 Concordia University, Nebraska Track & Field indoor season will mark the sixth in a row that has begun with the Bulldog Early Bird Meet. The 2024 Early Bird will take place Friday and Saturday inside the Walz Fieldhouse, where athletes from 12 institutions will convene. At this same meet a year ago, Concordia athletics combined for an impressive 18 NAIA automatic national qualifying standards. The meet schedule can be found below.

Head Coach Matt Beisel’s programs are coming off 2023-24 track seasons that saw the women’s team extend its streak of consecutive GPAC championships to 11 and place third (indoor) and 20th (outdoor) at the national meets while men’s team placed third in the GPAC for both indoor and outdoor and claimed a pair of NAIA top 10 finishes.

Concordia Bulldog Early Bird Meet
Friday/Saturday (Dec. 13-14) | Walz Fieldhouse
--Meet Schedule / Heat Sheets (PDF) | Live Results
--Live Streams: Concordia Sports Network

Competing Institutions
Benedictine College (Kan.)
Bellevue University
Briar Cliff University
Central Methodist University (Mo.)
Concordia University, Nebraska
Doane University
Friends University (Kan.)
Kansas Wesleyan University
Midland University
Morningside University
Sterling College (Kan.)
Tabor College (Kan.)

The Bulldog Early Bird will be the first of four home meets hosted by the Bulldogs this indoor season. Other home meets include the Concordia Polar Dog Invite (Jan. 17), Concordia Classic (Jan. 24-25) and Concordia Indoor Invite (Feb. 7). The Bulldogs will remain in the state of Nebraska for indoor competition all the way up until the 2025 GPAC Indoor Championships take place in Mitchell, S.D., in mid-February. The indoor national meet is slated to take place at the Alachua County Sports & Events Center at Celebration Pointe in Gainesville, Fla., Feb. 27 – March 1, 2025.

Beisel enters his ninth season as head coach optimistic about the prospects of the men’s and women’s programs. There are a combined 24 athletes (14 women and 10 men) returning that qualified for the 2024 indoor and/or outdoor national meets. On the other hand, Concordia said goodbye to hammer throw national champion Chris Wren, two-time pole vault national champion Zach Zohner and eight other athletes who earned All-America medals during their collegiate careers.

The returning All-Americans include Mayson Ostermeyer and Austen Rozelle on the men’s side and Abby Gerber, Kayla Kirchner, Josi Noble, Isabelle Salters, Gretchen Stottlemyre, Trinity Tuls, Zoey Walker and Abi Wohlgemuth on the women’s side. For a detailed preview of the 2024-25 indoor track seasons, click HERE.

The Bulldog Early Bird Meet will give way to final exams week and Christmas break. The indoor season will resume with the Scott Nisely Classic at Doane on Jan. 11, 2025.