Colorado Men: 15th place

My kid was FL finalist, sub 15 xc, sub 9 3200 and 3.9 gpa and filled out CU's online recruiting form. Never got a response. Even followed up with an email after jr year track. Nada. It was very weird. Not sure what experiences other recruits have had but this program was crossed off the list very early here.

The Denver Post has a story on the CU performances:

http://www.denverpost.com/running/ci_16688036

Apparently the worst finish since 1989. Wetmore says that he is happy with the finish though, saying the team is still fairly young.

You need 5 (five) people to score, not just 2 or 3. I won't argue that Wetmore never had talent, he obviously has many top notch recruits. What I'm trying to say is that his teams have never been stocked like Vin's team(top to bottom national lever runners), and he has a similar number of titles and podiums under his belt. Go back through the last 10 years of NCAA championships and look at CU's roster, then tell me how many of them were nationally competitive in HS. Almost without fail, their top 2 are big names, and then their 3-7 guys are people nobody ever heard of until they went to CU. Wetmore is great at developing guys who are extremely motivated and durable OR extremely talented.

on the women's side, recall McLaughlin was 5th last year.

this year theri #5 runner was 177th.

subtract 172 points from their total and they are right up there.

they return all their runners (mostly sophs this year) so if Allie doesn't try to overdo it (yes, that's a big IF), they will be contenders at least.

Cut the pony tail wrote:

Other schools are getting the better athletes. Colorado had its run , now its the other schools turn. Good coach , average coach , you recruit well win and your a genius. ( might even get a book written about you )

No talent you become average as Colorado is now.

lol@15th at nationals being "average"

here is a new definition of irony.

2 weeks ago, the football coach (Hawkins) was fired after a 19-39 record over 5 seasons. He gets a $2 million contract buyout and is hired by ESPN as an "analyst"

Wetmore feels that he needs to take the "blame" for finishing 15th at Nationals.

Lots of illiteracy on this thread, so unexpected.

The Buffs will be back toward the top. Boulder is a great place to go to school and an even better place to run. They may be missing out on some of the elite talents, but they'll continue to get good runners. If 15th is the worst they do, that isn't too shabby.

As for the football team...methinks it is a lost cause for the next 5 years. Frankly I wish they would quit paying these jackass football coaches so much. It's almost criminal what they make.

Seems to me that CU's slide coincides with Wetmore's focus turning to professional athlete management. I can't imagine it's easy to stay on top of both full-time jobs.

buffer wrote:

here is a new definition of irony.

2 weeks ago, the football coach (Hawkins) was fired after a 19-39 record over 5 seasons. He gets a $2 million contract buyout and is hired by ESPN as an "analyst"

Wetmore feels that he needs to take the "blame" for finishing 15th at Nationals.

Meanwhile, Wetmore had his program's budget slashed by the AD.

20/20 wrote:

Seems to me that CU's slide coincides with Wetmore's focus turning to professional athlete management. I can't imagine it's easy to stay on top of both full-time jobs.

That is actually a different Mark Wetmore. Funny I know, same name and same sport. :P

A little curious wrote:

That is actually a different Mark Wetmore. Funny I know, same name and same sport. :P

Whoa, shows what I know! I thought it ws the same dude all this time.

Mac Bundy wrote:

My kid was FL finalist, sub 15 xc, sub 9 3200 and 3.9 gpa and filled out CU's online recruiting form. Never got a response. Even followed up with an email after jr year track. Nada. It was very weird. Not sure what experiences other recruits have had but this program was crossed off the list very early here.

I've heard similar stories to this. Unreal.

Too much "medical" marijuana freely available in Boulder and elsewhere in CO.

Yep that's Mark Wetmore's achilles heel, recruiting. The man can coach but dislikes the fraternity rush aspect of recruiting. How else are they supposed to make contact? He loses out on a lot of talented kids this way.

That is why he has Billy Nelson on his staff, to handle recruiting. They lost a lot of "hot air" salesmanship when Jay Johnson got booted. But he was not interested in doing it any more and had dropped the ball on a number of good athletes. Things should be on an upswing with Billy.