Wow… so 2 seniors, 2 juniors, 0 sophomores, and 5 freshmen. So 9 total runners. Freshman class is as big as last year’s senior class was. We’ll see how many of them stick with it after this year. There were way more than 5 8th grade boys on the modified team last year though
Ditre, McGinn, and Patrick are the only ones in this roster who were in the program last year. One Prendergast (current freshman) did run a section 3 dual meet in track last year with the varsity as an 8th grader though
Maybe kids are sick of the stotan philosophy. Maybe when they watched what happened with COVID taking away all the things kids took for granted, football games, parties, prom--they realized that they didn't want to sacrifice the little things that made life fun for a bit of running glory and just wanted to enjoy themselves.
Maybe the Aris' should just relax a little. Let their kids breathe.
This exactly what I can see Bill doing, except replace “lax a little” to “tire”.
with only 9 boys out for the team, does this hurt the athletics department financially in any way?
I don't think a HS athletic department gets funded on the number of participants. XC would be a rounding error in any case, compared to football and soccer, etc.
Their XC program had sponsorship from Nike for a number of years; I'm not sure that's still going on. The program has been run on-the-cheap since Covid anyway; I don't think Aris has taken his teams out of Section 3 to race since 2019.
As for whether he'll retire? Don't know the man or his plans. They're very likely going to suck this year, but having 5 freshmen to work with might keep him engaged. We'll see.
Monroe-Woodbury- Purple Pride- thanks to legendary Coach Lou Hall who got a long tradition started over 50 years ago- he was a great basketball coach too. He was my PE teacher in elementary school and got me interested in running and I’m still doing it 50 years later. M-W has had a lot of good teams and also John Trautmann from ‘82 to ‘86.
Hi Chuck
Not correct. Maybe I should know Chuck but I don’t. There are a lot of people who could have posted what I said.
Wow… so 2 seniors, 2 juniors, 0 sophomores, and 5 freshmen. So 9 total runners. Freshman class is as big as last year’s senior class was. We’ll see how many of them stick with it after this year. There were way more than 5 8th grade boys on the modified team last year though
Ditre, McGinn, and Patrick are the only ones in this roster who were in the program last year. One Prendergast (current freshman) did run a section 3 dual meet in track last year with the varsity as an 8th grader though
According to that same website, it appears only 9 girls on the varsity as well. I find this super interesting and I don't know why this post hasn't blown up more. I coach a middle-of-the-pack program at a similarly sized school in a different state and I have 30 kids combined between the two programs. A school that has recently been to national-level meets with A LOT of success shouldn't go down to barely having a team in such a short amount of time. I don't have any insider knowledge, and insider knowledge will likely get this thread shut down anyway, but I'm curious now.
Wow… so 2 seniors, 2 juniors, 0 sophomores, and 5 freshmen. So 9 total runners. Freshman class is as big as last year’s senior class was. We’ll see how many of them stick with it after this year. There were way more than 5 8th grade boys on the modified team last year though
Ditre, McGinn, and Patrick are the only ones in this roster who were in the program last year. One Prendergast (current freshman) did run a section 3 dual meet in track last year with the varsity as an 8th grader though
According to that same website, it appears only 9 girls on the varsity as well. I find this super interesting and I don't know why this post hasn't blown up more. I coach a middle-of-the-pack program at a similarly sized school in a different state and I have 30 kids combined between the two programs. A school that has recently been to national-level meets with A LOT of success shouldn't go down to barely having a team in such a short amount of time. I don't have any insider knowledge, and insider knowledge will likely get this thread shut down anyway, but I'm curious now.
Wow. That is surprising. They only graduated 2 of their varsity girls and it appears that their #7 from last year’s state meet is the only one not on that roster
I have a 10th grade son. Only freshman out for his xc team last fall. This year one freshman coming in. This is a good running high school with a proud xc tradition. The pandemic definitely took its toll on youth sports participation. It wasn’t fun running around in masks and a full year of sports was lost in the Northeast area of the country. Soccer participation dropped at the youth level and soccer feeds xc as kids peel off from it in 9th and 10th grade and realize they have running talent. Expect this trend to continue for a bit of time. In addition, the sport is not viewed in high school as particularly fun or easy, and most of the authoritarian xc coaches who still seek to dictate to a generation of kids that definitely want to think for themselves doesn’t help. My son’s coach still reads from a 1990s high school xc coach playbook. These kids are different and lived through a crappy time in their young lives. They want to engage in a sport, if they even want to, that is welcoming and fun. I applaud their choices.
Do what athletic directors here in MD do to their XC coaches. Make XC a fat camp program. We can't cut people - even the people who have no business running on a team especially in 90 degree weather. Last week I had to give most of my time to getting 14 kids to jog 50 yards, walk 100 and the parents who sat there asking me inane questions.
Do what athletic directors here in MD do to their XC coaches. Make XC a fat camp program. We can't cut people - even the people who have no business running on a team especially in 90 degree weather. Last week I had to give most of my time to getting 14 kids to jog 50 yards, walk 100 and the parents who sat there asking me inane questions.
I think that we are going to see a drop off in participation numbers for a few years nationwide. The pandemic and virtual school is to blame. A lot of freshmen and sophomores, depending on your location, lost two years of organized sports as well as two years of normal high school social interactions. Many are lost for good as they question why start a new sport during your junior or senior year? They would not get recruited for collegiate running and might have no clue that is even an option.
I don't know if this is the reason that F-Ms numbers are off but picking up the Stotan approach halfway through high school cannot be easy nor appealing to most kids.
They lost one year maximum. Not sure where you're getting two years from.
As for whether he'll retire? Don't know the man or his plans. They're very likely going to suck this year, but having 5 freshmen to work with might keep him engaged. We'll see.
A lot of people at FM give XC a try for one year. And many of them quit after their first year because they don’t like the program with Stotan philosophy. We will see how many of those freshmen keep going after this year. They actually had only 1 freshman boy last year (MacBlane) and he did both XC and track and based on the roster, seems like he is not doing it this year. So no soph boys on the roster
According to that same website, it appears only 9 girls on the varsity as well. I find this super interesting and I don't know why this post hasn't blown up more. I coach a middle-of-the-pack program at a similarly sized school in a different state and I have 30 kids combined between the two programs. A school that has recently been to national-level meets with A LOT of success shouldn't go down to barely having a team in such a short amount of time. I don't have any insider knowledge, and insider knowledge will likely get this thread shut down anyway, but I'm curious now.
Has a team with 9 people or less ever made NXN before?
If not, this year it is possible for the FM girls team to do it. Although Bethlehem Central seems slightly better right now
“It's the lack of numbers that has been a limiting factor for Aris for years at F-M, which competes with a robust lacrosse program for athletes at the school of 1,400 students. Coming out of the summer, Aris knew it would be difficult to return to the national meet and lowered the usual training volume in an attempt to keep everyone healthy. He called this season's training mileage "mundane."”
Storied Program Will See Streaks Come To An End With Only Individuals Competing At NXR New York On SaturdayBy Doug Binder, DyeStat EditorFayetteville-Manlius, the Central New York high school with the most Nike Cross National...
Wouldn’t this be the case most everywhere then? Or is this just an anomaly limited to central NY?
It is the case "most everywhere." Open your eyes and look around.
My team has doubled in the last two years. A lot of other schools have had similar increases. Oh, I am at a private school and private school numbers have been going up since the pandemic.
As for whether he'll retire? Don't know the man or his plans. They're very likely going to suck this year, but having 5 freshmen to work with might keep him engaged. We'll see.
5 freshmen is pretty decent actually. Although none of them are solid. In 2014 there was only one freshman boy out for the team, and when he became a senior, his team took 2nd at NXN. There is only 1 other boy in his class that joined the team later on.
In 2008 there was a freshman boy who ran 22 minutes, and when he became a senior, he ran a sub-16 at NXN. And he wasn’t in XC as a sophomore and a junior. In the same graduating class, there was a girl who ran 26 minutes as a freshman, and as a junior she finished high at NXN.
In general, freshman year is pretty much a year of getting used to running many miles 6 days a week, and getting a feel of 5k’s if that’s their first year of high school running.
