They have Leo ranked 38th which seems perfectly reasonable
To bring this full circle, if someone said Leo was going to be 38th at the national meet as a junior, when he graduated high school, would everyone have considered him to be killing it? I would have expected him to be better. He’s not a bust, but probably hasn’t lived up to expectations.
bro ran 3:35 and a 20 year old sophomore and his brother ran 27:50 as a sophomore. That’s damn good !
They have Leo ranked 38th which seems perfectly reasonable
To bring this full circle, if someone said Leo was going to be 38th at the national meet as a junior, when he graduated high school, would everyone have considered him to be killing it? I would have expected him to be better. He’s not a bust, but probably hasn’t lived up to expectations.
Maybe not, but I think there are more favorable ways to contextualize it. Per Lacctic, he’s 41st. Among Americans to graduate in the class of 2023 or later, he’s ranked second, only behind Rocky Hansen.
Zegarski, Hough, Coleman, and Corrigan (lol) are also listed as juniors, but are all at least class of ‘22, if not older
Thought Noonan was injured but I'll take a top 50 finish at ACC's, needs solid consistent development and he could develop into a real threat. Random but another freshman that Gavenas kid, I didn't think he'd ever be this successful. 2nd at Heps as a freshman is cool, Harvard got a good recruit. These hs studs aren't burning out as much as we think they are, look even Connor Burns is doing great. Only one's who are performing bad are the one's who went to Duke and other confused programs with money.
I’d argue that Stanford is not the auto trophy most people think it is.
The biggest reason is your athletes are not running first. They are all things Stanford first, then running.
Academics, networking, life stress, keeping up with other geniuses. I also think they avoid going all in on running because they are used to nothing but success. Can’t not be the best at something!
look at the Stanford kids when they go pro, huge jumps! Grant F wouldn’t be competitive at all with his current college times.
It's a mix of this and the poster who said it's easy for them to recruit.
Stanford can generally get best recruiting class, but it's small since they do both distance and t&f events.
If every recruit is a hit and develops well, they are very good. If they have injuries and recruits who jump into the academic and extra curricular opportuniies that Stanford offers, then they will not be great.
Many years they have had 3-4 stars, but were just missing depth. This year similar. If top 5 have best race at regional, they could still sneak in to nats. More likely, it's wait til next year.
I disagree that Stanford pressure is a ball and chain for runners. Sure, it's demanding, but they know what they are signing up for. The pressure is actually a priviledge; why you choose Stanford in the first place.
They just had a lot of misses . Gavin Sherry has been injured for 4 years. Bergen never really developed. The young’s are solid but not superstars. And some of their recruits are good runners but not guys you expect to be 13:15 guys…
what is going to kill them is they aren’t bringing in 1 year portal guys that are already all American caliber. a team like Arkansas will bring in 3 Kenyans and a grad transfer when the need them.
In some sports the Cardinals have shown strong conference‑results. For example, their women’s soccer team this season is 13‑4‑2 overall and 6‑2‑2 in ACC play. EZDriveMA
This not really a shock. Stanford wins the directors cup for best overall sports program pretty much every year. Just like track, they also have plenty of Olympians in the other non revenue sports.
The NIL era and transfer portal have just messed up the system a bit. It's hard academically to transfer to Stanford, so they miss out in that arena.
By the way it seems like at least a majority of Stanfords men’s team is currently injured or has been at some point this season, definitely doesn’t help the nationals chances