University of Missouri-Kansas City Men's Cross Country

Benaud Shirley was named the Kansas City Track and Field and Cross Country head coach on Aug. 1, 2019. He is in his 19th year on the KC coaching staff heading into the 2025-26 academic year and his seventh overall as head coach. Shirley has been on the KC Roo staff since April 2008, serving as an assistant coach and eventually moving up to associate head coach until December 2018, with a specialty in mentoring jumpers. He was part of five Western Athletic Conference team championships: two in men's cross country (2016 & 2017), two in women's outdoor track and field (2015 & 2017), and one in men's outdoor track and field (2017). In 2019-20, Shirley mentored Christopher Bryan, who became the first-ever male athlete in WAC history to three-peat as Men's High Point Athlete, and Sommer Herner, who made school history as the first female athlete to win both the WAC Outstanding Track Athlete and High Point award at the same time in indoor championships. A 2004 graduate of Kansas, Shirley was a nine-time all-Big 12 Conference jumper, conference champion in outdoor triple jump in 2002 and 2003, and an NCAA Division I Outdoor Track and Field National Championships participant. He was a four-time Jayhawk Scholar and the 2003 Jamaica senior national triple jump champion. A native of Portland, Jamaica, Shirley earned his Bachelor of Science degree in economics from the University of Kansas. He and his wife Carmen have four daughters.

Clif Mitchell returned to Kansas City in 2022, following a three-year tenure as the Roos' assistant coach from 2008-11. In his current role, Mitchell works with sprinters, mid-distance and distance runners. From 2016-22, Mitchell was an Assistant Coach at Jenks High School in Tulsa, Okla., where he helped lead the Trojans' Girls' team to back-to-back Class 6A State Championships in 2021 and 2022. In 2021, his girls' 4x800m relay team broke a 38-year-old record with a time of 9:18.32, which they shattered the following year with a 9:12.04. Mitchell coached current Roo Ally Ryan at Jenks, helping her win the 2017 state title and break the state record in the 800m. Prior to Jenks, Mitchell was an assistant coach at Tulsa from 2011-16, helping lead the men's team to a Conference USA Indoor Championship in 2012 and mentoring eight-time NCAA All-American Bryce Robinson, Indoor All-American Audrey Jean-Baptiste, and four-time Conference USA 800m Champion Katherine Camp. During his initial stint at Kansas City, he recruited Olympian Courtney Frerichs and coached student-athletes to 22 school records and three conference championships. Mitchell earned his bachelor's degree in exercise physiology from Tulsa in 2006 and a master's in the same discipline from Kansas in 2008. He was a member of Tulsa's track and field team and broke the school record in the 600-yard run. Originally from Edmond, Okla., Mitchell graduated from Edmond Memorial High School in 2002, earning all-state honors in