Saint Leo University Drops Cross Country and Track

Cutting xctf definitely doesn’t seem to make the most financial sense but clearly the school is in a bit of trouble and there were likely looking to cut back and thought these were the programs with the least blowback… if I were on some of the other teams I would be concerned we will be next as they cut teams to the minimum d2 allowable number. And I I were a faculty member I would be keeping my eyes peeled for other job opportunities.

The school has a very small endowment and low name recognition so that’s not great for them.

Aren't their internationals on full ride?

they claim to be lol

You went to st leo? That explains a lot. Carry on.

OP, this is the type of response you get on LRC when anything bad happens at a religiously-affiliated university. You would get all kinds of support if you went to a secular university. To many posters here, all religious people are voodoo witch doctors.

As an alumnus of a DII school, I feel for you. And I especially feel for those who are currently on the team. My school was on a different side of the country, but seems like our programs were/are not all that different.

I remember going to St Leo in 2021 when they hosted DII nationals. Seemed like a nice place. The course was great.

My question is, why would they have been investing so much into hosting things like DII XC nationals up until now, when all of a sudden the program gets cut? Answer: competing visions among school management (i.e. coaches/Athletic director vs. president/chief academic and financial officers). So often schools have basically no unity when it comes to decision-making and it ultimately results in the school trying to do everything and nothing at the same time. Very unhealthy and a bad sign for the future of the institution.

Also--111 faculty/staff positions cut as a result of this sweeping decision? If I were a faculty member I wouldn't just be keeping my eyes peeled for other jobs... I'd be getting the heck out of there before I get cut!!

The language here about "being innovative" as justification to cut programs is bullcrap. They aren't innovating anything--they're just trying to appeal to prospective students with whatever kinds of programs are hot and attractive right now. Hospitality and human services was the attractive thing 10-15 years ago, now they're cutting that and replacing it with robotics. Eventually that will die out too.

Thus is the fate for most small liberal arts schools that have no recognizability beyond their immediate proximity: they lose their uniqueness in order to keep up with the latest trends, but always seem to be a step or two behind. Always a net loss in their projects. Never considering the loyal students they currently have. Always alienating their endowments by cutting programs.

yeah but how many times did they host the NCAA DII National Championships?

How specifically are voodoo witch doctors fundamentally different from any religious "authorities"?

I saw several of these athletes on the portal and now it makes sense.

The unfortunate side effect of the pandemic for small private colleges was that distance learning woke people up to the value of what they were paying for. How many students went home, took a semester of online classes, and then realized that they could be doing this at their local state university for 1/3 of the price? Once schools re-opened, many didn't return and opted to continue at the state school. Less academic costs, less housing costs, and less loan debt.

I care. This was a very successful team. The sport, like swimming, is one you can do your entire life and is conducive to health and a long-lived alumni donor base. St. Leo's is in an excellent place for training for Florida because it has majorly steep hills and runners and cyclists come from far and wide to run around there. XC and TF athletes also tend to get good grades and help the university. You know that the costs of just one administrator and secretary and extra useless projects per year far outweighs the xc and tf budgets. Get your priorities straight, St. Leo! You have already made the education at your institution of questionable worth by prioritizing contingent faculty over permanent, tenure-track and tenured faculty.

The sad reality is a TON of athletic programs are hanging by a thread. All the instagramming and bold talk from the ADs is just noise. It’s not only DII, look at half the zombie programs in the smaller conferences of the NCAA. CUSA for example had multiple events with less than 10 competitors at the conference meet.

I predict in 5-10 years it’s going to be the super elite schools, then the rest will be on a DIII model.

For the same budget impact and title IX implications, they could have eliminated M/W Soccer instead (a program that has been well below average.) But the AD started at Saint Leo as a Soccer coach, so that tells you why they chose the sports they did. Sports funding has always been a popularity contest.

Who??

Very true, and as it should be. Athletic scholarships at programs and in sports that don't help drive the school's mission don't make good sense.

Sorry to hear this.

I just checked the Mayor's Cup points for Cross Country (Track and Field is not a Sunshine State Conference sport) and it affirms what you are saying. They typically score 6 to 9 points and it is one of the most successful teams in the department, for both men and women.

If they were cut for performance, the whole department should be cut.

The men's and women's swim teams, on the other hand, are not competitive.

One of the challenges for Cross Country/Track is that Track is not a conference sport, so there is no title to win and no points to be scored for the Mayor's Cup. Nova Southeastern competed in the Peach Belt Conference in Track for a number of years but have dropped that and are now "distance only" for Track.

Don't get it twisted. Though the OP wants to make it about performance, it never is about performance. At the level of this school, the entire athletic department is more of a glorified intramurals program used to boost enrollment. They're looking at how the teams help shore up tuition numbers with non-scholarship athletes matriculating at a time when students overall are increasingly avoiding mediocre high-priced private schools. It's a cost:benefit analysis ultimately and the OP doesn't seem to know how to go about figuring that out.

I'm surprised to hear this because I've seen several schools recently add XC/track as a way to recruit more students.

The majority of their team is international, which means they have A LOT of scholarship money invested in these athletes.

This is 100% true. I work in d1 athletics on the sales and marketing side. I graduated from a d2 program that made the national meet multiple times. There is no reason to go to a d2 school now a days.