Audra Smith moves cross-town to Seattle Pacific...

SEATTLE--University of Washington track & field strength and conditioning coach Audra Smith (left/photo courtesy University of Washington) has been named as an assistant track & field coach at Seattle Pacific University.

Although the school has not posted a release on its web site, the hire was confirmed by Dan Lepse, SPU's sports information director on Thursday.

At Washington, Smith was the strength and conditioning coach for three seasons, after starting at UW as an assistant coach for multi-events in 2009-10.

As the multi-events assistant coach, Smith helped coach sophomore Jeremy Taiwo to the best decathlon performance by a Husky in 24 years, as he scored 7,521 points to take second at the Pac-10 Championships. Taiwo was in All-America position at the NCAA Championships after day one, but was unable to finish after a fall in the hurdles. On the women's side, freshman Sarah Schireman also had the eighth-best heptathlon score in school history, scoring 4,623 points.

Smith was a multi-events specialist during her competitive career at Idaho State, taking second at the 2007 Big Sky meet, scoring 5085.  She also scored for ISU in the 100, 200, 100 hurdles, and javelin, and was a key component to the Bengals winning the conference title in 2007.

The native of Pima, Arizona, who earned a masters degree in health education from ISU in 2007, is expected to work with Falcon head coach Karl Lerum in the sprints and multi events.

NOTE:  Seattle Pacific University and the University of Washington contributed to this report.