Stephen Moore joins coaching staff
Ex-Wildcat standout replaces departed Kenneth Hines
ABILENE -- ACU head track and field coach Jon Murray announced Tuesday that he has hired former Wildcat national champion Stephen Moore to replace Kenneth Hines on the Wildcat coaching staff, effectively immediately.
Hines recently left ACU to return to the high school coaching ranks in the Panhandle where he will be an assistant football and track and field coach.
Moore, one of the top decathletes in the United States, spent the two previous track and field seasons as an assistant coach at Wayland Baptist University in Plainview. Prior to that he was a volunteer assistant at Texas Tech University.
Last month Moore finished fifth in the decathlon at the United States' Olympic Trials, narrowly missing a spot on the U.S. Olympic Team for this month's Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. A broken pole in the pole vault competition may have cost Moore his shot at the Olympics.
Prior to the pole vault event was in fourth place -- only 38 points out of third place -- in the decathlon after seven events and heading into the pole vault. However, on his second attempt at 16 feet, 0.75 inches, his pole broke, and Moore couldn't recover. He did clear 15 feet, 9.0 inches for 849 points, but his eight-event total of 6710 points dropped him to fifth place and an insurmountable 161 points out of third place.
Moore, though, has been one of the top decathletes in the United States and the world since he graduated from ACU in 1999. He won the gold medal in the decathlon at the 2003 Pan Am Games, and the silver medal at the 1999 World University Games. He also won the 2001 USA indoor heptathlon championship.
During his ACU career, Moore won the 1996 NCAA Division II decathlon title and the 1999 NCAA Division II outdoor long jump title. He was cruising toward the 1999 decathlon championship before he was disqualified from the final event (1500 meters), leaving him second in the overall standings.
At the 1999 USA Outdoor Championships he finished fifth earning several international spots. In 2000 he was in third place at the U.S. Olympic Trials (where he tied the meet record in the high jump at 2.17m/7-1.50) before a no-height in the pole vault dropped him out of the top 10. In 2001 Moore won the USA Indoor heptathlon crown (6,078) then placed fourth at the IAAF World Indoor Championships.
Moore and his wife, Tiffany, have two children: MacKenzie and Simeon.
