Official 2013 NCAA XC Discussion Thread

You are a joke and website sux wrote:

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2013 and you can't get your sh!t together

Letsrun needs to figure out how to move to virtual servers and spin up extra server instances on days they expect heavy traffic. I sometimes wonder if they are running off single server in someone's closet.

Once again the rankings prove that the voters (coaches) can't get it right. They are either biased, don't know their own team or don't know the competition. Perhaps all three. Here's a view of the Oct 1st NCAA rankings, the final NCAA team rankings and the NCAA meet results. Stanford, Arkansas, Princeton, Tulsa and a few others, clearly over ranked throughout the season. Wisconsin, Indiana, Air Force were under ranked. Draw your own conclusions. As for me, the rankings are almost useless.

Oct 1st Rankings:

1 Oklahoma State (12) 360 Midwest Big 12 Dave Smith (8th)

2 Colorado 342 Mountain Pac-12 Mark Wetmore (19th)

3 Northern Arizona 333 Mountain Big Sky Eric Heins (7th)

4 Oregon 316 West Pac-12 Robert Johnson (2nd)

5 BYU 304 Mountain West Coast Ed Eyestone (14th)

6 Arkansas 297 South Central SEC Chris Bucknam (6th)

7 Tulsa 287 Midwest Conference USA Steve Gulley (12th)

8 Portland 284 West West Coast Rob Conner (24th)

9 Princeton 256 Mid-Atlantic Ivy Jason Vigilante (2nd)

10 Syracuse 241 Northeast ACC Chris Fox (9th)

11 Iona 214 Northeast Metro Atlantic Ricardo Santos (6th)

12 UCLA 201 West Pac-12 Mike Maynard (5th)

13 North Carolina 195 Southeast ACC Mark VanAlstyne (2nd)

14 Texas 191 South Central Big 12 Mario Sategna (1st)

15 Indiana 171 Great Lakes Big Ten Ron Helmer (7th)

16 Colorado State 163 Mountain Mountain West Art Siemers (2nd)

17 Eastern Kentucky 162 Southeast Ohio Valley Rick Erdmann (35th)

18 Providence 155 Northeast Big East Ray Treacy (30th)

19 Wisconsin 152 Great Lakes Big Ten Mick Byrne (6th)

20 Georgetown 111 Mid-Atlantic Big East Patrick Henner (15th)

21 New Mexico 109 Mountain Mountain West Joe Franklin (7th)

22 Notre Dame 98 Great Lakes ACC Joe Piane (39th)

23 Stanford 91 West Pac-12 Chris Miltenberg (2nd)

24 Virginia 85 Southeast ACC Peter Watson (2nd)

24 Florida 85 South SEC Mike Holloway (7th)

26 Florida State 72 South ACC Bob Braman (14th)

27 Villanova 58 Mid-Atlantic Big East Marcus O’Sullivan (14th)

28 Arizona State 52 West Pac-12 Louie Quintana (13th)

29 Michigan 46 Great Lakes Big Ten Alex Gibby (4th)

30 Columbia 35 Northeast Ivy

Final Rankings:

1 Northern Arizona (6) 353 2

2 Oklahoma State (4) 347 3

3 Colorado (2) 343 1

4 Stanford 322 6

5 Oregon 309 4

6 New Mexico 284 11

7 Syracuse 267 14

8 BYU 264 5

9 Tulsa 259 13

10 Arkansas 255 9

11 Portland 250 10

12 Columbia 230 8

13 Michigan 214 16

14 Villanova 205 20

15 Iona 203 7

16 Eastern Kentucky 185 17

17 Wisconsin 170 19

18 Princeton 141 15

19 Notre Dame 137 22

20 Indiana 134 11

21 Providence 119 21

22 Virginia 104 NR

23 Texas 95 25

24 Air Force 80 29

25 Dartmouth 66 26

25 NC State 66 NR

27 Colorado State 62 23

28 North Carolina 39 18

29 Georgia 28 NR

30 Florida 18 NR

NCAA Results:

Place Team Points

1 Colorado 149

2 Northern Arizona 169

3 Oklahoma State 230

4 BYU 267

5 Oregon 274

6 Iona 284

7 Portland 293

8 Indiana 306

9 Wisconsin 326

10 Syracuse 329

11 New Mexico 334

12 Arkansas 340

13 Virginia 370

14 Texas 376

15 Eastern Kentucky 380

16 Providence 396

17 North Carolina 403

18 Villanova 415

19 Stanford 417

20 Air Force 419

21 Michigan 433

22 Princeton 469

23 Notre Dame 484

24 Dartmouth 551

25 Columbia 580

26 Colorado State 606

27 Tulsa 628

28 N.C. State 630

29 Florida 654

30 Harvard 678

31 Georgia 690

webfoot wrote:

Letsrun needs to figure out how to move to virtual servers and spin up extra server instances on days they expect heavy traffic. I sometimes wonder if they are running off single server in someone's closet.

We are working on something like that which should hopefully be ready soon. In the mean time I'm looking into getting a cryosauna to install in wejo's closet to help things along.

I suppose it's oversimplifying things to presume that runners from Norway and Sweden would be at an advantage in conditions like today's, but the SMU women, for all the attention they attracted yesterday for looking blond and beautiful, came in DFL with 790 points even though four of their runners are from European countries with ugly winters.

WAHHHHHHHHHH the babies are crying again

Fastnbulbous wrote:

p0rnwatcher32 wrote:

D3 is just pathetic

Why you gotta be like that? D3 runners by definition are in college for academics first, and have no athletic scholarships. The level that some athletes reach in that situation is often amazing. See Nick Symmonds, Will Leer, Greg Nixon, Andrew Rock.

Cheserek averaged 4:46 pace for 10K, while D3 winner LeDuc averaged 4:55 pace for 8K in similar conditions, also in Indiana. Not shabby at all.

Just to confirm - they moved up the start of both races by 115m but they did not adjust the finish line?

Big Boy D1 wrote:

WAHHHHHHHHHH the babies are crying again

Fastnbulbous wrote:

Why you gotta be like that? D3 runners by definition are in college for academics first, and have no athletic scholarships. The level that some athletes reach in that situation is often amazing. See Nick Symmonds, Will Leer, Greg Nixon, Andrew Rock.

Cheserek averaged 4:46 pace for 10K, while D3 winner LeDuc averaged 4:55 pace for 8K in similar conditions, also in Indiana. Not shabby at all.

I don't understand that hatred of D3 runners. It seems counterproductive to dis non D1 runners in a world that can barely tell the difference. Be happy for each. D1 runners run for different reason then D3 runners. But both run, regardless, and both work insanely hard.

D1 runners run for different reason then D3 runners.[/quote]

And what might that be? They picked their parents better? Sure some D3 runners aren't as dedicated/competitive as DI runners, but don't lump them all together.

ladedah wrote:

Just to confirm - they moved up the start of both races by 115m but they did not adjust the finish line?

It's correct that the finish line stayed the same and the race was shortened. I heard 110 meters but who knows exactly.

Probably a 20 second adjustment, which means nobody broke 30 minutes, really.

Ben Saarel time is close at hand. The battles that are coming! Oh BOY!

I too thought the same thing. Andy Powell is an excellent coach, and it has shown in Cheserek's case. What should also be said is that even though Cheserek is a freshman, he is (at best) of sophomore age--IAAF lists him as being born February, 1994. Saarel, on the other hand, was born March, 1995. It will be great fun seeing these two guys tangle not only at NCAAs, but also at PAC 10s (yes, I know).

glad to be wrong wrote:

I thought Cheserek had limited upside in college. I am more than happy to be wrong.

I think he has thinned out a bit. Maybe this is just the result of higher mileage training.

Credit to Oregon and Cheserek - fantastic performance.

Considering the number of variables in play in cross country, I'm impressed that the coaches had the top 5 finishers at nationals as their top 5 teams on Oct 1 and in something not far off the actual order of finish.

Between Oct 1 and the final poll, the coaches correctly moved Ok St down, incorrectly moved Stanford too far up and punished BYU a bit too much for their 3rd place at Regionals. I'd say not a bad job at all.

This year after the top 5 you had a lot of pretty good teams that were difficult to put in reliable rank order. Consider Columbia, for example. Solid team, final poll rank was #12, really struggled today and finished 25th but could just as easily have had a great day and finished, say, 10th. [I realize BYU and Oregon nearly slipped out of the top 5, but I'd say both teams underperformed yet had enough more fire power than the next tier of teams to stay in the top 5 anyway. I thought Oregon had an especially tough day after Cheserek with maybe the exception of Pepiot. If Stinson, Fleet and 1 of Leingang, Melancon & Winn had come up big, they just might have been in the mix with the top 2.]

p.s. I was one of those people who thought Ok St would peak at the right time and win but the final coaches' poll was right and I was wrong on that matter.

Seton Hall wrote:

Most of their scholarships going to (long) distances combined with recruiting/training in Boulder is nearly a can't miss. Throw in a good coach and the titles miraculously appear - just like magic.

They did beat the other distance only schools, so that was awesome.

For perspective, however, imagine if other NCAA sport teams had to compete with each other with so much scholarship disparity.

Let's see how today's top 10 teams shake out on the track.

No, let's not. This is cross country, and track is track. They are two different sports. If some schools choose not to focus on XC, that's on them, but I'm sick of people making excuses for poor cross country performances. If you think it's all so simple, why are you even watching?

withrowned wrote:

Ches's loping stride reminds me a lot of John Ngugi .

0.5/10!

You have never coached XC or T&F. Two different sports and you can't compare. Not all XC runners are in a training cycle that allows them to achieve at a high level in both sports. Track racing is extremely different than XC and often contested in very different conditions from November to June.

As mentioned, scholarships are dedicated to some distance programs over track programs. Why wouldn't Colorado or NAU build distance programs instead of track programs. They have the best environments on a campus for developing distance runners.

It's awesome a freshman won no matter where he attends. Doesn't mean he's going to win 4 or that their team will win. I saw Kennedy win as a freshman. Can't remember how their team ever did. NAU was second that day as well.

I flipped back and forth between all 3 National Meets interested in competition, not caring if one was better than the other. Obviously the quality is better at D1 but I still respect the efforts of anyone with the balls to lace them up and go at it. Unlike some critics here.

Rankings: Are for the spectators. Races are for the athletes. I'm sure some teams are dissapointed, others are elated and others finished where they should have. Happens every year. There were a lot of runners that wished they were on the starting line today. Nobody actually involved in the event makes excuses if they didn't meet their goals. They can only put themselves in position to have a chance to do their best. No guarantees after that. Although, I agree some coaches should find another career option when their leadership is negative and not helpful in a teaching moment.

I think you miss the point of this persons post. What is being stating is that schools put way more scholarship money into distance runners than there opponents. This gives these Cross Country programs a big advantage. Yes Cross Country and Track are two separate sports, but they pull from the same scholarship pool. Most of the schools in the top I think are fully funded and probably put close to 10 - 12 scholarships into their X-Country programs. Thus, giving them a distinct advantage over schools that also want to be good on the track and compete for indoor and outdoor track championships. Also think about the schools that only sponsor Cross Country, the max scholarship they have access to is about 5 I believe. It would be interesting what schools would be good if 5 was the max scholarship they could use in cross country. I think you would see who are really good coaches because it would force them to develop more talent rather then throw money at the best kids. But just because you are a distance orientated program, doesn't mean you can't be great in track. NAU, Oregon and BYU have balanced programs and always do well during the track season and finished top 5 today. Traditionally, Arkansas was the model for program success!

Now that I've stopped shivering I have meet photos posted at:

Men's Race:

http://www.f-11.us/photos/categories.php?cat_id=496

Women's Race:

http://www.f-11.us/photos/categories.php?cat_id=497

Please do me a favor and post these links on the other XC websites. I'm out of the loop.

Love the results that show how far the people moved up or dropped back from 8K to 10K.

http://www.letsrun.com/2013/11/2013-ncaa-cross-country-results-men/

Remarkable how some of the people fell apart late.

Paul Chelimo fell from 29th to 82nd over the last 2K. Ouch.

http://branchsportstech.com/2013_Meets/xc/11-23-NCAA/IndResults.php?EN=1&BN=645

Parker Stinson steadily dropped back after going out near the leaders, costing the Ducks valuable position.

http://branchsportstech.com/2013_Meets/xc/11-23-NCAA/IndResults.php?EN=1&BN=468

Age matters only if he is over the allowable age. He ran like a damn pro today and beat excellent runners. I've seen his age listed as 1/1/93 before and I was sick of seeing him beat up on High School athletes. This was legit against guys who are likely close in age to him (I'm guessing him to be 21-22).

Tip o the cap to Ben S. from CU!! STUD!!!