This has gone TOO FAR - D2 School suspends top athletes for.... Practicing????

Practice?

We're talking about practice?

Practice!?

We're talking about practice!?

How silly is that?

Sounds like it's time for SVSU's top runner to go live in a cabin in the woods, train on his own, grow long hair and a beard, come back and compete in the first outdoor meet under an assumed name, run a 3:52 mile, and if possible outkick Nick Willis.

Or transfer to a real college.

Where is there a rule written that breaking an arbitrary rule leads to a suspension of competition? No appeal or warning? This could have easily been handled by the worker doing her job and not crying to the president of the college because some 130 pound guys were being passionate about their sport. This isn’t a difficult situation. A reasonable person could have came to a reasonable solution. Nobody got hurt.

While this looks bad on both sides —athletes not following rules, employees not handling their duties with competence — the real story is a major oversight by a corrupt athletic administration at a fledging university . Not only did they suspend the athletes, they attempted to expel one of them and fire the head coach...over using the wrong treadmills. Saginaw Valley State University has infamous for numerous NCAA Violations over the last couple of years, including: letting over 30 ineligible student athletes play (leading to NCAA barring certain sports from post season competition), a head coach having sexual relations with an athlete, numerous teams caught partying in spite of Covid Protocols (with lesser punishments than the one at hand), and others that are outside the scope of this topic.

Finally, this should concern all members of the running community. The athletes suspended for this had just come off of major record setting performances, including a top all time D2 5k, yet the athletic director seems to not even knows who they are — no warning, no meeting, not even an email. This is a school with a pristine 300m track and a general record of mediocre at best sports performance. The track team is one of the most successful programs on campus and these athletes are still subjected to this third-rate treatment. This should concern all of you. As runners, nobody outside of our insular community gives us the smallest modicum of respect. Situations like this should be brought to attention so that we can band together and have a fighting chance while they continue to cut Cross Country and Track programs to buy a new football water cooler.

-GT

Not trying to justify that what the athlete did was right, in fact far from it. However, these restrictions and suspensions seem ridiculous.

A quick look at their website shows a completely new head of athletic training /assistant athletic director, Bradley Smith. Funny how running outside in the winter hasn't been a problem until now. Couple this with limiting treadmill use , what did they expect would happen? Yes they have a very nice, state of the art, 300 meter indoor track, but any level headed person would understand that it is a ridiculous request to ask runners to do their mileage on that track alone. These guys have to be running 80 miles a week or more, completely unsafe to do that all on an indoor track.

Obviously we don't have all the details, but banning the distance coach from ever having the opportunity to be head coach as well? This AD is up on his high horse and it sounds like he doesn't have any plans on actually communicating with the coaches or the team.

I don't know how those Saginaw runners act, but take a look at any other team at that school and tell me they aren't doing the same, or worse. Parties are hitting teams at every school hard, I'd be shocked if this isn't the case in SAGINAW.

Looks like they were explicitly told not to run outside, from the looks of the punishments given, I'm sure they were told there would be consequences if they did run outside.

Funny how you suggest they break the rules and run outside, yet condemn them for breaking the rules to run on some treadmills.

Yeah they are most likely in the wrong for the treadmill situation, but you can't play both sides buddy.

The over-bureaucratization of the modern college campus on full display.

This isn't a modern college campus. It is D2. No professor or administrator who has a brain is working there.

The punishment is completely unjustified. As some of the other posters have mentioned, there was no real due process. Yes, the worker's feeling may have gotten hurt, however, there is no rule that would show that based on this case of disrespect, there should be this type of suspension. Regardless, a meeting with the athletes and whoever else was involved should have been arranged without any decision being made prior to this meeting.

If the fact of whether or not the coaches should have been fired over this shows how cut throat the AD is and the decision making. To fire the coaches or prohibit the distance coach from ever becoming the head coach over the situation that had nothing to do with them and only the athletes, should have been taken up solely with the athletes. This is what a public school and this country is based upon is innocent until proven guilty not guilty until proven innocent or just guilty and here's the punishment. The punishment of a two meet suspension is over the top without the understanding of all sides of the story beforehand.

Regarding the worker, for her to send an email that was sent straight to the President's office was based with intent to cause a situation. If the worker really felt uncomfortable about the athlete giving her the so-called attitude, then that is a personal issue and should have went to her boss about it. With the intention to go straight to the President's office and not directly to the Head Track Coach or the Distance Coach, shows that her intention was to get justice for how the athletes made her feel. Should they have gotten punishment for affecting how she feels? Absolutely not. Should they have gotten the right to explain and defend themselves for the purpose of coming to an understanding? Absolutely.

- A

Bingo! Follow the weird arbitrary rules set forth completely at random by the athletic administration that is inhibiting you from participating in your sport which probably helps pay for your education. Fall in line, don't stand up for yourself when administrative overreach takes place, again seemingly arbitrarily. Seeing other comments about potential firings and being kicked off the team only reiterates the fact that this is not about breaking some rules. Everyone breaks rules, and it is handled accordingly. This seems to be different for who knows why. Idk just my perspective

Magglio "Mags" Ordonez,

Unbelievable what the university is doing to these student athletes! The punishment for their actions were nothing past impulsive and should be reconsidered immediately! A terrible look for not only the athletic director, but the president as well. Give these kids justice!

Its a INSIDE JOB by the head coach....

Sad day for SVSU. Put yourself in these kids shoes for a second. They’ve been told they can’t run outside and they are probably running an absurd amount of mileage. Administration practically didn’t give them a choice but to use treadmills. Of course I wouldn’t condone sassing off to an employee but these D2 athletes need to do there job too!!! And to get SUSPENDED. That is the athletic department trying to cover their own poor decisions Bottom line.

This kid ran faster than most runners in D1 will ever run over 5k but that doesn’t extinguish the fact that he’s still only D2. It’s truly pointless to sit there and fight the fact that if you compete D2, you obviously have little talent and your marks mean essentially nothing. Regardless what anyone thinks, sometimes the track does lie. This kid is more or less just a dead subject, track times don’t matter the division you compete does. You can go out and run whatever you want but until you run with the big dogs you can’t understand what it means to be a high caliber runner. D2 will always be less competitive and to drop divisions just so you can place is sad honestly. The running world/any sports follower of any kind will not respect you unless you race up at the high level. Why would you even want to go to college if you plan to only run D2 I’ll never understand that.

What are you even talking about? This is the most ignorant comment I have ever seen. Firstly, there are plenty of Pro runners who have went D2 first and have went on to compete in the Olympics. Secondly, everyone on the SVSU Distance team started out either at SVSU or transferred from another D2 school or JC. If you want to look at D1 runners transferring to D2 schools, take a look at the contrasting school, Grand Valley State. Lastly, the whole point of the majority of people competing in college is the ability to find out what your body is made of and how far you can get in your career. Not everyone is on the same path of starting out at D1 and going pro soon after. That is not the case for 98% of athletes that compete in any level.

“Waited turns”... that’s hilarious. Unless they are running 5 miles or less (which they are college athletes I can’t imagine that’s the case) would take a whole day for that to work.

Thanks for the input, Albert Camus

It just comes down to the fact that if you’re not D1 nobody cares, you’re irrelevant. It’s not that you don’t see athletes going pro or even making the Olympics from a lesser division because you do but they are severely underachieving by doing so. A lot of times we’ll see above average athletes drop divisions and run at an easier levels because they know they won’t stand a chance with the big dogs. Don’t see the point leaving a D1 program to drop to D2 even if you were going to a good D2 like I assume this Grand Valley school is to you. Sure there are some pretty bad D1 schools and going to one that sucks could be arguably pointless but at least you’re competing high level and people notice you. Imagine telling someone you’re accomplishments and having to add you’re only d2 (God for bid you’re not even D3 or worse).