NCAA XC meets - why Fridays instead of Saturdays?

My first guess is football. Probably easier to do a meet on Friday and be able to keep it the same week of the season no matter what, then try to do it on Saturday and have to adjust around home game football schedules (which often having changing kickoff times due to TV) and deal with limited hotel options.

I used to coach, usually all xc meets were on Friday’s and these were the reasons I was given.

1. Hotels and football, especially at places like Texas A&M, FSU, etc.

2. Athletic department staff, it is easier to have people work Friday vs Saturday. Usually there is another sport Saturday (volleyball, soccer). Timing companies are also more available on Friday and can hit a road race/ high school meet Saturday.

3. Coaches want to go to a high school meet Saturday or have recruits visit.

All the above, but also:

Allows coaches and athletes more of a weekend in season to recover. Not having to work the weekend is a nice perk for guys who are making the same as high school teachers, for the most part.

Also, it lends itself to a consistent weekly training schedule, that fits nicely for a lot of schools:

Sunday-long

Monday-easy

Tuesday-tempo

Wednesday-easy

Thursday-easy

Friday-race/hard workout

Saturday-easy/off

You could make replicate this in different ways; but if you want to keep the same rhythm and race on Saturdays, you have to do harder work on non race Saturdays and push long runs to Monday.

Ridiculously poor schedule.

Same reason we changed tiebreakers. The head of the coaches association think we can draw a bigger audience if we don't compete with football. Not sure it works, but he also wants to only dual meets "for spectator draw"