Men of Oregon and Cross Country

If they sold a Men of Oregon 2013 calendar where the boys were naked, I might consider buying one.

I you really want to know, and it has previously been pointed out in several other threads, Oregon made a decision several years ago to put emphasis on trying to win the Track and Field championships. In order to do this, they have had to spread the limited 12.6 scholarships around to throwers, sprinters, decathletes, and middle distance guys. This just leaves very little margin for a xc team. If they suffer any setbacks, as was the case with the loss of the triathlete (left) and the British freshman (injury), it is hard to be competitive with the programs who specifically focus on xc/distance runners. Ulike Oregon, programs such as Oklahoma State, Colorado and Wisconsin put a great deal of emphasis on this part of their program, to the detriment of the track and field part. Simply put, it becomes a mathematical question for the men's teams (not so much for the women who get 18 scholarships).

This was what Martin Smith did for Oregon and they ran him out of town for it. After bingeing on distance runners for the Vin Lanana era they are back to using the Smith playbook. In hindsight it was smart of Vin to get out of the coaching role before they took any more scholarships away.

At least at Ory they have great tutors available at Lane CC a few miles down I5.

Maybe you were sleeping while Lanana's program was using precious scholarships to bring in Ashton Eaton, Cy Hostetler, Mike Berry, Crouser, Skipper,

Elijah Greer, Dakotah Keys, Russ Hornsby amongst others???

No, this is not what Smith did for Oregon.

You are eliminating the part where Smith turned a lot of people off, and where Smith could not recruit like VL and company...

A Duck wrote:

Ghost of Martin Smith wrote:

This was what Martin Smith did for Oregon and they ran him out of town for it. After bingeing on distance runners for the Vin Lanana era they are back to using the Smith playbook. In hindsight it was smart of Vin to get out of the coaching role before they took any more scholarships away.

No, this is not what Smith did for Oregon.

You are eliminating the part where Smith turned a lot of people off, and where Smith could not recruit like VL and company...

This is exactly what Smith did at Oregon and exactly the stated reason for him being run out of town. I do agree, however, that this was not the real reason he was run out, but it is why they said he was run out.

It is kind of ironic, funny, whatever, that the guy who got run out of town for not being able to recruit and coach distance runners has now beaten them twice in a row at Oklahoma. He recruited fine at Wisconsin, he recruits fine at Oklahoma. He probably would have recruited just fine at Oregon too if locals hadn't poisoned the local recruiting water only to complain about the lack of recruits.

This is actually a very astute, intelligent observation, which is very rare or LRC, I must say. I think this pretty much hits the nail on the head.

Adding insult to injury, rumor is that the super recruit from England that has been in Eugene is leaving the Ducks. He has yet to compete for Oregon due to injury. Another Luke V departure in 2 years? Could it be the men's coach?

What, because it agrees with YOUR viewpoint?

Same IP in responses as the OP has. Please stop it.

That's a way to justify some of the shortcomings, no doubt, but they were 20th and didn't have a single All-American. It's not like the 19 teams ahead of them are all spending 100% of their scholarships in distance running. Even Arkansas beat them in both track and cross country in 2012. So Oregon has certainly been underperforming in the last couple years (so have other teams, such as their buddies at the Farm).

Doesn't xc have 12.6 scholarships separate from the track and field team? Maybe their new coach isn't as good as Lanana?

Also, their women follow the same "strong, well-rounded track team" model and still have a successful xc team. I'm not expecting the men to win every year but they should be better.

sc runner wrote:

Doesn't xc have 12.6 scholarships separate from the track and field team? Maybe their new coach isn't as good as Lanana?

Uhhh.....no

Lananna the NY guy who was fired from Stanford and ended up at some DIII baby school.

seasoned ranker wrote:

Also, their women follow the same "strong, well-rounded track team" model and still have a successful xc team. I'm not expecting the men to win every year but they should be better.

Its easier for the women, with a 6k race, to do well with more middle distance oriented girls.

It also sounds like the women have more scholarships?

They may spread out the 12.6 scholarships, although the mens roster is still stacked. No reason to under perform with a handful of those guys.

The women do have more scholarships, but I still feel like a school that invests all scholarships into women's xc would have an advantage over a school with Oregon's strategy. I'll give you that MD runners would have more success in the 6k, though.

We had a lot of distance runners on academic full rides or close to it at my school. That helps alleviate the hiccups of a program with significant track scholarships.