PULLMAN, Wash. (July 24, 2024) – A contingent of seven past Washington State athletes are making their way to Paris, France this week for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games, July 26 – Aug. 11. The group will represent six different nations while competing in men’s and women’s track & field, women’s rowing, women’s soccer, and men’s basketball.
Competing for Team USA will be C.J. Allen (track and field) and Trinity Rodman (women’s soccer), recent graduate Maribel Caicedo represents Ecuador in track and field, while another recent graduate, Jasneet Nijjar, will compete for her native Canada in track and field. Charisma Taylor will shine for The Bahamas in track and field while men’s basketball player Josh Hawkinson will represent Japan and rower Ieva Adomavičiūtė will compete for Lithuania in Paris over the next few weeks.
Allen left WSU following the 2017 season as a two-time second-team All-American and two-time Pac-12 Champion in the 400m Hurdles. He qualified for his first Olympic Team by finishing second last month at the USA Olympic Trials in Eugene, Ore. Allen currently ranks seventh in the world in the 400m Hurdles and the second highest-ranked American.
Also competing in her first Olympics for Team USA is Rodman, one of the young brights spots for USA Soccer. Rodman attended WSU in the Fall of 2020 but was unable to compete after the the fall season was delayed due to Covid-19. That winter, she declared for the NWSL Draft and was selected with the second overall pick by the Washington Spirit, the second-straight year WSU had the No. 2 overall selection (Morgan Weaver in 2020), while becoming the youngest player ever to be drafted. That season she was named NWSL Rookie of the Year and US Soccer Young Female Player of the Year.
Caicedo, WSU’s school record holder in the 100m Hurdles, capped her tremendous Cougar career last month by finishing second at the NCAA Championships. The native of Guayaquil, Ecuador, shattered the school record, lowering it by more than a half second during the season as she earned First-Team All-America honors. Caicedo enters the Paris Games with the 15th-fastest time in the world this season.
Nijjar, a Surrey, British Columbia native, capped her Cougar career holding four individual school…
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