As one of the most decorate student-athletes in program history, Shane Niksic is now in his third season as a member of the Mavericks’ cross country and track coaching staff, and second as the cross country team’s head coach.
In his first year as the Mavs’ head coach (2021), Niksic coached three All-RMAC and two all-region runners, who helped lead the Mavericks to solid fifth (men’s) and tenth (women’s) place finishes at the RMAC Championships. The Mavs also placed eighth and 14th at the NCAA Division II South Central Regionals after the men claimed their first team win in seven years at the Gig Leadbetter Maverick Stampede.
In the fall of 2020, the Maverick men’s cross country program enjoyed a solid pandemic-effected cross country season. The men took fifth at the RMAC Championships, CMU’s highest finish since 2015. The Mavs then went on to finish second as a team at the D2 XC National Invitational Meet behind a 1-3-4 individual finish, led by individual champion Tony Torres. The CMU women also had two All-National Invitational performers, including Kira MacGill, CMU's first ever RMAC Freshman of the Year in cross country.
Niksic then helped guide Torres to school-records in five different events during the 2021 indoor and outdoor track seasons as he won the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference titles in the indoor mile and outdoor 1,500 meters while claiming second and third place finishes at the NCAA Division II National Championships in those events, respectively.
Torres then broke two more school-records, including Niksic’s 800-meter record, while qualifying for the 2022 NCAA Division II indoor championships before Trevor Smith capped his career with a school-record 3,000-meter steeplechase effort at the end of the 2022 outdoor season.
A 3-time all-American and 5-time All-RMAC performer during his 2011-15 career with the Mavericks, Niksic had previously been on the coaching staff at Western Colorado University for the three previous seasons before returning to CMU in the fall of 2020.
A 2010 graduate of Conifer High School, Niksic was a member of CMU’s inaugural men’s cross country and track and field teams during the 2011-12 academic year and served as a team captain for all four years of his running career. He was CMU’s first male qualifier to the NCAA Division II Championships qualifier during the 2012-13 indoor track and field season and later became the Mavericks’ first men’s track & field All-American when he earned the first of three all-America honors during his senior season as he finished ninth in the 800 meters at the 2015 indoor championships. He then placed seventh in the 1,500 and 12th in the 800 at that year's national outdoor meet to cap his brilliant Maverick career.
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He was also a member of the Mavs’ 2014 cross country team, which is the only squad to have qualified for the NCAA Championships and was recently named to the Mavs’ all-decade team.
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After graduation with his bachelor’s degree in in exercise science in 2015, Niksic then worked in Austin, Texas, at RunLab Austin - a bio-mechanics clinic for runners. In his work, Niksic utilized high speed video gait analysis to help structure rehabilitation plans for athletes.Â
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He then moved back to his native Colorado and earned a master’s degree in the spring of 2019 through WCU’s High Altitude Exercise Physiology program. His research emphasis was focused on body temperature regulation during exercise and also in extreme environments.
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He also helped guide the Mountaineers to a 2019 RMAC Men’s Indoor Track & Field title and to five combined top-10 team finishes at the NCAA Division II Cross Country Championships in his three years on the coaching staff under head cross country coach Jennifer Michel.
