i saw that they finished 7th, why are they so bad? it seems with so many good high school runners coming out of that area they could be a lot better
i saw that they finished 7th, why are they so bad? it seems with so many good high school runners coming out of that area they could be a lot better
speclin wrote:
it seems with so many good high school runners coming out of that area they could be a lot better
They all seem to depart the area for Montana or Oregon.
Since when does Oregon not produce runners. Rupp, Eagon, klotz, stoutenbourg, vail, jesperson, maag.
speclin wrote:
i saw that they finished 7th, why are they so bad? it seems with so many good high school runners coming out of that area they could be a lot better
I graduated from there.
Why *would* they be any good at XC? They're a small school. It's a miracle they have such an impressive basketball program, considering their small enrollment and limited resources, compared to a state school... But it's partly motivated by the fact that the alumni and others pay attention to the basketball results. How many alumni would be motivated to give money if they had a ranked XC team? Answer ... not many. Nobody but us pays attention to XC results, but everybody (comparatively) pays attention to bball.
Private schools have to go for bang for the buck in sports. That means getting results in sports that rich alumni might actually care about, and that will put the school's name in the national spotlight if possible. Bball has done that for Gonzaga.
No track program.
Up until a couple of years ago, they had more second place conference finishes than any other school in the WCC. This is rough from memory, but Gonzaga had about an 8 or 9 year streak in the 90's of placing second to UP at the conference meet. At that time the program had about one scholarship per gender to divide up. Since that time, some of the other programs in the league have increased funding for their programs, or just improved. For several years Gonzaga has had no scholarshp money. There is no on-campus track. The school does not commit much in the way of financial resources to the program. The head coach teaches at Mead and isn't able/willing to devote the time to recruiting etc. as many coaches.