How WSU’s Joseph Holthusen went from underrecruited to the NCAA Indoor Championships
Joseph Holthusen had one offer to run hurdles for a Division I track and field team upon graduating from Bishop Carroll High School and even that one, Wichita State, was hesitant.
Less than three years later, Holthusen earned second team All-American honors at the NCAA Indoor Championships on Friday in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Holthusen entered with a season-best time of 7.78 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles, but nicked his first hurdle on Friday and settled for a time of 8.31 to take seventh place in his semifinal race.
“A lot of people don’t realize but qualifying for the NCAA Indoor Championships is possibly the most difficult meet to qualify for in the world, including the Olympic Games,” WSU assistant coach John Wise said. “If you look at just the standards across the world, it’s not as tough as getting in the top-16 in Division I because people all around the world are in the NCAA system.
“I bet if you lined up these 16 guys and lay out their scholarship offers coming out of high school, Joseph’s would look a lot different. That shows how much he’s overcome to get to where he’s at now. It’s really special.”
Holthusen can laugh at it now, but he used to have to send the WSU coaches film of his races and update them on his times ran in high school. Wise admits that the recruiting process was more of Holthusen recruiting WSU than the Shockers wanting the local state champion whose times were good at the Kansas high school level but didn’t register for the regional hurdlers WSU typically recruits.
Now Holthusen has solidified himself as one of the best hurdlers in Shocker history. Shannon Armstrong (2004) is the only other hurdler to earn indoor All-American status and Holthusen’s best time (7.74) is barely off Armstrong’s school record of 7.72.
“My first dream coming into college was just to make the conference team and place at conference,” Holthusen said. “Now it’s like, ‘Wow, this is nuts. This is awesome.’ I didn’t dream about this. Well, I dreamed about it, but it didn’t seem as attainable as it has this year.”
For WSU’s program, it is unheard of for a relatively average high school hurdling prospect to make such a vast jump into superstar territory at the Division I level where the hurdles are three inches higher.
Holthusen doesn’t believe he has done anything different in the past year to propel him to such a high level. In his opinion, he has worked hard in the same way he has for the last three years and that has had a cumulative impact on his career.
“I feel like it’s more about the stuff I was doing three years ago,” Holthusen said. “It’s not just the stuff that I did this past year, it’s the stuff I did the last few years that has allowed me to get to where I am now. It’s not always easy to get out there on those days off in the summer. But just putting in the work, even if its not your best work, doing those extra hurdles, those extra workouts and trusting the coaches was really big in becoming a high-level athlete.”
In terms of work ethic, Holthusen is among the best on the team. But a veteran coach, Wise has seen stories like that before. What he hasn’t seen is a mental make-up quite like Holthusen’s.
“This kid believes in himself as much as anybody I’ve ever met,” Wise said. “Even when maybe we weren’t believing in him in the recruiting process, that didn’t knock his confidence in himself. He kept believing he was going to be the best guy. When you’re around him, you get the sense that he truly believed he was going to make the finals in this race and I believed it too. It’s incredible.”
This story was originally published March 12, 2021 at 6:00 AM.
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