Paul Thornton

Biography

Paul Thornton is in his seventh season with the Kansas track & field program during the 2025-26 seasons after being hired in September of 2018 by head coach Stanley Redwine. Thornton serves as an assistant coach for the Jayhawk track & field squads where he works with the combined events athletes. In his first six seasons, Thornton has led the Jayhawks to success in the horizontal jumps and combined events with 11 All-American awards achieved, two Big 12 Conference individual champions (Alex Jung, outdoor decathlon and Cordell Tinch, 110-meter hurdles) and one Freshman of the Year in Tinch. Thornton guided Jung to an outstanding career at Kansas that consisted of the best performance in school history in the decathlon. At the 2025 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championship Jung scored 7,746 points, placing seventh overall and breaking his own school record. Jung owns six of the school’s top-10 decathlon performances. In addition, Jung is the Kansas heptathlon record holder with 5,797 points as well as seven of the top-10 marks in school history. Andover, Kansas, native Taylor Klein looks to take over the combined events for Kansas with Jung’s graduation. The senior has qualified for the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships in each of his first three seasons as a Jayhawk in the decathlon. He has also earned a spot at the national meet in the long jump with a notable performance of 7.70m (25-3.25 ft.). He, too, owns three of the top-10 decathlon performances in school history.