Last year's DIII Champion transferred to North Carolina (6th in the ACC, I believe) and was not in the varsity for the conference meet. I don't know if he was injured.
Last year's DIII Champion transferred to North Carolina (6th in the ACC, I believe) and was not in the varsity for the conference meet. I don't know if he was injured.
to clarify he was 5k champ, correct?
Yes, I added that in a later post. 5,000 champ and DIII record holder.
LAX would get nuked at any big time d1 race. Probably score 1000 goddamn points.
almost 300 guys broke 14 minutes in d1 counting indoors and outdoors last year. That doesn’t even count all the steeple/1500 guys that didn’t run one who would pounce lax. I’ve seen the BEST guys/girls in d3 go d1 and with a couple exceptions, just become another face in the crowd. I love d3 running - way more than d1. But the level d1 is at isn’t even one tier up, it’s another stratosphere
Like Notre Dame? There isn't a region in D1 where they aren't in the top half and would compete for a qualifying spot in some of the worst.
Obviously the top of D1 is another level of magnitude up, but that is not most of D1. D3 Uchicago actually won the B race at that same meet against all D1 schools (Depaul, Marquette, and such). Obviously they would get thrashed by almost all the teams in the A race, but it's just not true that all D1 teams are all even comparable to each other.
You have to be blind if you don't recognize the outcome. How do you think UW-L gets like 10 kids who can run a sub-22 200? Is it because Wisconsin just breeds elite sprinters? No, it's because they go D3 at UW-L whereas a lot of them would go low-D1 or D2 in other states.
And I hear you, it's not that simple; there are economic reasons why someone might want to go to a in-state school, and obviously it is also true that UW-L does a great job of developing talent. But come on, to pretend like they're not getting kids, year after year, that are D1/D2 talent is just the ultimate bullsht. And further, they absolutely are competing against schools with less resources -- they have almost 10,000 undergrads! That is four times the size of the both the median and the mean D3 school.
We should remember or be made aware that Wisconsin High School track isn't even three full months most years. That the majority of meets the first five weeks of the season are on tracks under 200 meters, painted on surfaces that cannot accommodate spikes. To frame it a different way, 55m in basketball shoes is more common than 60m in spikes. You then get to outdoor, which is hell until May. The number of schools that can even train in spikes when and while indoors is, at best, around a dozen. On top of all that, we should also remember how rare it is for a sprinter to not also play football and/or basketball or even play baseball during the track season. From a logistics perspective, speed in Wisconsin is an uphill proposition. And the less said about the actual training done in the state, the better.
The product of these systems, through climate, training and season length, are far from what they can be. For how La Crosse develops 10 kids sub 22? They find the best place finishers at the state meet who love track. They won't have the times to go D1, but if their zip codes were in Texas, they would, and that is the Wisconsin D3 advantage. If the "advance scouts" at Oshkosh or Whitewater haven't already identified the potential, they go to La Crosse.
The best D1 teams have 7th men running 13:45. The worst D1 teams have their top guys running 15:45. The best D3 teams have their 7th men running 14:45.
The D3 crazies will never believe it. They either don't know what Lacctic is or they disregard it. They prefer to compare times from different courses. But don't compare track times because they don't like that either. Nick Symonds was an Olympian you know.
Smaller, less resourced schools? You clearly don't know the WIAC.
There are reasons the WIAC schools are D3 and not D2. Mostly around money.
Moving to D2 puts a lot more monetary constraints on an athletic program and school, and the WIAC schools don't want to do it. So be it.
And UW-L doesn't beat up on smaller, lesser resourced schools. Check the history of D3 champs in men's and women's XC. They don't do bad, but they don't dominate.
And check the history of WIAC champs. Again, they don't do bad, but they don't dominate.
UW eau Claire built a $110 million athletic building. According to Google their endowment in 2020 was $80.5 million. Seems insane in my opinion - the undoubtedly richest school in d3, albeit with completely different priorities, doesn’t have an athletic building close to that despite an endowment around $25 billion - but they’re not strapped for cash at all
I am sorry but did someone post that alex phillip transferred from D3 to UNC and underperformed and didn't compete at the D1 level? maybe someone else is being referenced and/or maybe he had an injury in cross. the old UNC bio for alex phillip has him running the number 2 indoor 5k time in school history and the fastest outdoor 10k in school history. (obviously pre more recent parker wolff and other's performances).