For comparison, look how the UNLV women did in their conference meet today. Their 8 runners finished in the last 8 spots.
I’d love to hear the story on what’s going on there.
For comparison, look how the UNLV women did in their conference meet today. Their 8 runners finished in the last 8 spots.
I’d love to hear the story on what’s going on there.
I mean, Oregon could have pulled a few random chicks out of class in the Pharmacy School and gave them the same cocktail that team members get. They would have been ultra competitive.
Former UO women’s coach Tom Heinonen leads a UO school club team that competes in collegiate meets so easily 2 or 3 women could have been eligible and run if they had made the effort.
Is today the first time a conference cross country meet has been run on a golf course that is consider elite enough to host the prestigious US Open as Chambers Bay did in 2015?
rojo wrote:
I've been thinking about this some more and wanted to try to clarify my thoughts. I know 2021 is an unusual year but it just seems that if OREGON of all schools doesn't think it's important to record a team score in cross country then why in the hell should any other program?
An AD would never let
Other ADs already are like, "We're never going to be competitive as a team, let's jjust have a few good individuals."
That being said, as an ex college coach I totally understand why you would want smaller rosters. All it takes is one bad apple to ruin the bunch. If you have 20 kids, many of whom have no shot at ever being a major player (maybe they end up as the 5th woman but are only a few seconds better than your star freshman) statistics indicate you are much more likely to have one person show up in practice in a negative mood. All it takes is one doubter saying, "Coach sucks." or "Do you want to party tonight" to really bring down the momentum.
But I just think if we want our sport to be treated legitimately, we'd damn well be focused on recording team scores. And we'd never let NCAA xc and track be scheduled 2 days apart.
Get a 400 runner who ran high school xc or get an 800 runner and have them job the course to help out.
"It is an unprecedented challenge for Track and Field / Cross Country. What Robert [Johnson] and his staff have been able to do is really remarkable, because when you look at trying to juggle two seasons in one, trying to travel with large groups in a disjointed way just to ramp up for an indoor championship and have us [Oregon Ducks] peaking at just the right time. Again, another great job by [coach] Robert [Johnson]." - Rob Mullens, University of Oregon Athletic Director - March 2, 2021
Here is my take:
For the poster that thinks its better to have 4 all in runners then bring in a few "bad apples"......these girls run at OREGON, you dont have bad apples. If you do, its the coaches fault for not fostering a team culture of unity.
Matter of fact, its all coaching. Most college coaches do a terrible job with culture and team unity. There are 10,000 junior coaches that do a better job at getting 13 year old kids to buy into the grind of being good.
If a team at this level doesnt have 5 on the line, you suck as a coach and should step down.
I think Oregon needs to say what happened. The other girls on the team could be injured/ tested positive for covid/ or quarantining. There may have been a last minute exposure which resulted in only running 4 ladies last minute. I know this is uncommon for the internet but maybe we should give them the benefit of the doubt.
The military industrial complex didn't want them to kick ass and bring the war to an abrupt conclusion. Follow the money.
That point about quarantining, or a last minute contact, could actually be the case. At my school we had a kid waiting to get on the bus he told to go home because of contact tracing. And if that’s the case I could see why the university wouldn’t mention it, looks kinda sketchy if some girls were considered close contact but others weren’t.
Back up an armored truck at the Taylor household in Utah and make her an offer she can't refuse. Give her spouse a job (is that ncaa legal?). Free private school for the kids. Emphasize the warmer climate! Blood Rubies and emeralds. Get the picture?
She has developed an army of high achieving, yet lightly recruited (by major programs), LDS ladies. If she could recruit internationally and go after some of the best stateside girls...
It's amazing that after 30 replies, no one actually has an answer.
I guess it's just a problem from the fact that the NCAA is split. Some schools view themselves as track, some view themselves as xc and some view themselves as both. I thought Oregon was one of the few that was both but both really kind of means track with individual good distance runners if there are other schools in your conference going all in on distance.
Hearing the news about the club team makes it even more disappointing. Just record a team score.
oldschoollrc wrote:
Waiting to hear Rojo Bot's take on this one.
+1
DGAF about Pac12 xc unless it's in the fall, spring xc is a clown show. ?
I heard she is a hard coach to run for and rushes her athletes back to running too soon. Lots of injured runners is why they only raced 4. She isn’t getting the Job done at Oregon at all!
The depths of your naivete is amusing.
Speaking strictly with the women’s team lately- I think since that Powells left their ability to snag a deep recruiting class of American high schoolers took a hit. No way this would’ve happened under their watch.
Runner10287 wrote:
The Brojos have to suffer from some kind of cognitive disability right? Either that or they think they are running’s version of Skip Bayless.
This
former Oregon duck wrote:
Speaking strictly with the women’s team lately- I think since that Powells left their ability to snag a deep recruiting class of American high schoolers took a hit. No way this would’ve happened under their watch.
People like Maurica Powell and Kelly McDonald / Strong / (whatever her name is now that she shacked up with that Jimmy assistant coach tool) can recruit.
People like Joe Franklin and Lehman-Winters seem to be limited to dangling scholarship money in front of desperate ringers like 5th year transfers and foreigners.
Coach might have done this wrote:
Maybe coach went with an incomplete team because the whole team wasn’t committed, slacking, etc. And she did it to send a message.
“If you’re going to be out here half-assing these 1ks at paces even d2 middle schoolers can jog, y’all can stay at home and troll letsrun while scissoring each other!!!! I’m taking the mfing winners and you can go transfer to a juco!!!”
Woah, woah...let's circle back to this plausible explanation. Any pics, btw?
Last minute contact tracing is probably the reason why. But that's no excuse. It's part of the athlete's duty to not get caught up in that stuff. They shouldn't be going to parties or hooking up with random people, especially right before their conference meet. That might be a bit extreme to some people, but it would've prevented any quarantining.
Some schools seem to have tons of problems with quarantining, while other schools don't. It's not random, it's because those schools don't take preventative measures. Obviously it's impossible for the entire team to stay in a bubble for 100% of the year, but you can make the probability of exposure small enough to eliminate most of these situations.
Anyone consider that this may have been Robert Johnson’s call? Not Helen’s? I’ll admit...some of it probably had to do with not wanting to get beat by Oregon State or some actual chump schools without their top athletes (no way would Robert let his NCAA indoor qualified athletes waste their time on this)...