Sean Carlson is doing terrible at Colorado

CU is not a hard place to recruit to, for the normal student.

But to be nationally competitive everyone is fighting over the same 20 kids. CU and Boulder and very expensive so without massive scholarship it’s really hard to afford.

if you are a top 20 kid, you have options. Lots will be more affordable than CU.

They have also never gone that hard in the international recruiting game. Probably because it is hard to get internationals in or there is no funny money for them (the schools with Kenyans and Euro grad students have them for a reason.)

I dont love the guy by any means but he has done well at multiple schools.

You mean Dean Casey? That was the only Buff ahead of Simeon. So I guess we will see your Kole and raise you an Aiden Smith.

Since when are Oregon doing well? They went two straight seasons without sending a single male middle distance or distance athlete to nationals. Their current top runners:

- Simeon Birnbaum, came in with PBs of 1:47/3:37/3:57 and has run 1:49/3:37/3:52, including a last-place finish at indoor NCAAs

- Matthew Erickson, had a 1:48 PB before Jerry and has since run 1:46 (1:50 in high school) and won NCAAs in the 800 (frankly not even sure Jerry coaches this guy)

- Koitatoi Kidali, had a 1:42 PB before Jerry and has since run 1:46/3:38, DNF at indoor nats

- Rheinhardt Harrison, had 1:48/3:59 PBs before Jerry and has run 1:48/3:38/3:54, one NCAA meet (failed to make the final)

- Abdel Ladjel, ran 7:54/13:44/28:56 before Jerry, has run 13:34/28:29 since

- Evan Bishop, ran 7:58/13:45 before Jerry, has run 7:50/13:38 since

- Quincy Norman, 13:48 before Jerry, has run 13:44/28:27 since

- Aiden Smith, by far his biggest success story, ran 4:06 in high school and has since run 28:21

These are the success stories. Not pictured: Connor Burns, 3:58 high schooler; Sergio Del Barrio, 8:39 U20 steepler; Tayson Echohawk, 4:01 high schooler; Tomas Palfrey, 1:48/3:40 high schooler; Evan Dorenkamp, 3:55 transfer; etc. etc. etc.

They have the best roster of any collegiate team by a country mile and their top times are in the range of 3:37-3:41, 13:30-13:40, 28:20-28:40...they make Colorado's roster look like a D3 team and yet have comparable times. Seriously, explain how Oregon and Jerry are "doing well". Maybe 10 years ago these would be impressive times but UNC has two 7:30 guys, Villanova has two 3:33 guys, New Mexico has two under 13:10, freaking Loyola Chicago has a guy running 27:50...Oregon's best 5k/10k guys are outside the top 30.

And the Oregon women are doing ok but only bc of the infusion of international talent.

Yeah the infusion of Maddie Elmore and Annika Thompson who are all-Americans from Oregon. Well I guess Annika runs for Ireland…so sure, valid point then

College coach only doing well because of talented recruits? Fire him

Tough for anybody to follow Wetmore. Dude did it all at CU. Will see if Carlson is up to the challenge. BYU has filled the void left by CU as the place to be for American collegians.

Track/xc could pay for themselves at Boulder or at least earn a significant amount of spent money back. Use the track to host meets, the xc course to host meets, summer camps, etc. I see so few universities engaging with the local communities and some schools don't even host college meets at all.

I second this!

Parkrun the XC course.

I'm tired of these "bash xxx coach" threads and am requiring registration to make future posts. That way we'll prevent the same jealous coach posting from two different names.

We've always said moderating coaching threads is the hardest thing we do here as there are tons of people who think they could get big results if they had big talent who are bitter and just tear down other coaches non stop.

Is there really a 4-page thread on a college coach was hired in July?

Repeat after me. Give coaches some time. Remember when Lananna went to UVA and there was years of abuse of him on here? Then Jerry at Oregon?

It takes time. Wetmore was not a good recruiter , Carlson is but Carlson was hired in July so that means he didn't get to do what he has a proven track record of and what is the key to college success - recruit. Get back to me in 2028 at the earliest if you are going to judge him.

Are people forgetting that the Colorado men were 25th in Wetmore's last year in xc and scored zero points at NCAAs in track indoor or out? Under Calrson, they were 19th and already scored indoors.

It’s kind of wild for me to read all these people with no skin in the game bashing Sean. I was a former athlete of his who didn’t make the cut after a year and even I don’t dislike the guy enough to throw out random insults after a year that he got onto campus in August, so it baffles me random posters have enough disdain to do so

After 9 months at CU, Emma Zawatski is transferring to Georgetown.

Has any other coach laid waste to an entire team and caused an insane level of turnover as quickly and abruptly as Carlson? The criticism is justified I think.

This isn't a new pattern either. He has been churning through athletes like clockwork ever since he landed at Tennessee. And all of that turnover in the name of a "win-now" mentality... just to DFL both the men and women at conference...

Yeah, the criticism is justified.

The AD made one of the best coaching hires in any sport in the past decade.

Not saying Deion is a great coach, but CU went from not even an after thought in football to be on national tv often and winning several seasons worth of football games in one year. The money CU has brought in for both the athletic dept and university is well worth the increase in football spending. (Deion spends almost nothing on recruiting BTW.)

I went to a CU track meet for the first time a few years ago (my daughter was a CU student and worked in the athletic dept so it was a perfect mix). I could not have been more underwhelmed at a track facility in my life especially for a university with a good track reputation. It was not even on par with a HS facility.