LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. – Trinity University's Derick Lawrence has been selected Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) Coach-of-the-Year for both men's and women's cross country for the 2012 season in exclusive voting by the head coaches in the conference.

Both Trinity squads won their first-ever SCAC titles at the 2012 conference championship meets held October 27 on the campus of the University of Dallas. Men's Results | Women's Results

The regionally-ranked Trinity men (fourth in the latest South/Southeast USTFCCCA rankings) scored 26 points – just 11 points in front of Colorado College. It was the closest finish for the men since the 2006 race when DePauw University defeated Centre College by the same 11-point margin. Ironically, Lawrence was a senior runner for that DePauw team and contributed an all-conference performance for the Tigers in that 2006 race.

The Tiger men were paced in this year’s race by the second and third-place performances of seniors Pancho Escobedo and Rob Edmonds.

The 28th-ranked Trinity women's cross country team (ranked first in the South/Southeast USTFCCA rankings) totaled a perfect score of 15 points to easily outpoint second-place Colorado College at the 2012 conference cross country championship meet. The perfect score was the first in SCAC women’s cross country championship meet history. Only the 2005 DePauw men, which Lawrence was also a member, had produced a score of 15 in SCAC championship meet history prior to the Tigers’ 2012 perfect outing.

Led by 2012 SCAC Female Runner-of-the-Year, Vanessa Moreno, Tiger runners placed first, second, third, fourth and fifth in the team’s history-making performance.

Lawrence, who is in his first season at Trinity, is the first coach to sweep both COTY honors in the same season since DePauw’s Kori Stoffregen pulled off the feat in 2006.