Stunned by U Colorado Buff's mediocre recruiting class

Goo Gone wrote:

CU does OK considering that the runners have to be real students, unlike at eugene clown kollege. And that they don't recruit age cheating kenyan grampas, like at eugene clown kollege. And that they don't use the NOPe dope, centro sauce and oregon juice, unlike at eugene clown kollege.

+1

Hey runner dad with advice,You're just now realizing this?!?! Wetmore has has subpar recruiting classes for years (COMPARED TO OKLAHOMA STATE, OREGON, STANFORD AND OTHER RUNNING POWERS). Yes he does get some blue chippers, but NOTHING like the schools I just mentioned.And yes he does great with these kids!He's unmatched as a coach. Whats wrong with all these blue chippers each year passing on a chance to work with this coach!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

runner dad with advice wrote:

I was checking out their roster (because that's how lame I am) and was really surprised at the quality or lack thereof of the freshman class:

http://www.cubuffs.com/SportSelect.dbml?&DB_OEM_ID=600&SPID=260&SPSID=3960

These guys are the champs and are likely to win again this year!

I know one of the runners and he's good, but I guess I expected a lot of sub-9:00, sub-4:05 guys, like Saarel.

If Wetmore can win with these guys he's a friggin' genius. How can he compete when Stanford and Oregon (and Wisco for that matter) are getting much higher quality recruits?

(And, yes I know that some of the times are at altitude. Even if you adjust for the CO runners, they're still just good, not great.)

Let's look at who they got...

Reiny Barchet (WC Henderson PA) - 9:08.97 indoors for 3200m before getting injured his junior year; NXN#21 as a junior

Ryan Forsyth (Severna Park MD) - 9:09.97 for 3200m, 14:39.52 for 5k with a very good improvement curve throughout HS

Ethan Goznales (Broomfield CO) - 9:00.58 for 3200m at Sea-level (Shoreline WA); 4:19.37/9:25.55 double at state (runner-up in both); Runner-up in XC at 4A State

Chris Herrick (Hellgate MT) - 9:17.36 for 3200m as a junior at Arcadia

Paul Miller (Poudre CO) - local kid, never ran at Sea-level (so 9:33.28/4:22.72 are his PRs) but was Top-10 at 5A State XC last year

Miller is the only one that doesn't look like an elite prospect, but Top-10 at CO State is still very good (and worthy of being a walk-on at his hometown University of Colorado).

If they put all that together WITHOUT any scholarships, that's going to be a very good class within a year or two.

Why does everyone regard Colorado as an ivy league type college? The acceptance rate is 88% and a lot of the people there do drugs. Wetmore is a great coach and you can receive a great education there but everyone bashes oregon for being bad academically and I cant see the difference with colorado.

gfvfgvshdjcvhsdfgsjh wrote:

Why does everyone regard Colorado as an ivy league type college? The acceptance rate is 88% and a lot of the people there do drugs. Wetmore is a great coach and you can receive a great education there but everyone bashes oregon for being bad academically and I cant see the difference with colorado.

The CU trolls hype up their snotty white school that's why. ARWU-USA ranks for PAC12's nine academic oriented schools: 1:Cal+UCSF 2:Stanford 10:UCLA 14:UW 25:CU 33:USC 45:UA 46:ASU 47:Utah

CU is very polarized.

While they have a really high acceptance rate and plenty of moron sociology and business majors, they have just as many stellar science and engineering grads.

Add to this that grade inflation there is far far less than the national average (http://www.gradeinflation.com), and I can attest to this personally too. Add to that the importance of research and grants, nobel laureates, etc all of which CU has a surprisingly high amount.

Basically if you're an engineer, biochem/molecular bio, or physics/chem major it will be hard to find a better education. That said Uni is still what you make it.

A great coach with fairly talented runners that are hungry and living/ training at altitude has the upper hand versus a school with a great coach and very talented runners that aren't as coachable and are living/training at sea level.

U.S. News and World Report on the College Rankings (probably not a terribly bad indicator of admission criteria). Somewhat surprising:

Big-10 leads with 13 teams in top 100: (12) NW; (28) Mich; (37) PSU; (41) ILL; (41) Wisc; (52) OSU; (62) Maryland; (68) Purdue; (69) Rutgers; (69) Minn.; (73) MSU; (73) Iowa; (75) Indian; only Neb missing.

ACC has 12: (7) Duke; (23) Wake; (23) UVA; (30) NC; (31) BC; (36) GT; (47) Miami; (62) Syr; (62) Clemson; (62) Pitt; (69) VT; (91) FSU; only Louisville and NCState missing.

SEC has 7: (17) Vandy; (49) FL; (60) GA; (60) TexA&M ; (86) AL; (91) AU;; (97) Miss; missing 5

PAC-12 has 6: (5) Stanford; (20) Berkeley; (22) UCLA; (23) USC; (52) Wash; (86) CU; missing 6

BiG-12 has 3: (52) TX; (75) Baylor; (82) TCU; missing too many to count.

Considering only average score for top 4 schools in conference, then PAC-12 wins (PAC-12 is top heavy, and doesn't include CU): PAC-12 (17.5); ACC (20.75); BIG-10 (29.5); SEC (48.75); and Big-12 (69.66 for only 3).

CU ranks as only the 37th school among the BIG 5 conferences. Heck, their tied with Alabama, and they only exist to churn out football players.

Take it with a grain of salt.

jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj wrote:

gfvfgvshdjcvhsdfgsjh wrote:

Why does everyone regard Colorado as an ivy league type college? The acceptance rate is 88% and a lot of the people there do drugs. Wetmore is a great coach and you can receive a great education there but everyone bashes oregon for being bad academically and I cant see the difference with colorado.

The CU trolls hype up their snotty white school that's why. ARWU-USA ranks for PAC12's nine academic oriented schools: 1:Cal+UCSF 2:Stanford 10:UCLA 14:UW 25:CU 33:USC 45:UA 46:ASU 47:Utah

In other words, CU is 33rd in the country, and eugene clown kollege is not one of the 9 "academic oriented" PAC 12 schools. Which means that eugene ck is nowhere, and CU is near the top. It still amazes me that rupp is so stupid that he had to drop out of eugene clown kollege! How is that even possible?!

Sorry, CU = 25. eugene clown kollege too low to be ranked.

It's a party school, but a pretty good one.

PAC 12's 5th man (UW) kills them, ACC wins. B10 has a nice pack but not much up front, hence no better than 3rd in this meet.

Come on !!!!!

Colorado had exactly 1 scholarship available for all men they were recruting this year !

Its very simple

No money lesser class !

But you really could choose your words better

How would you like to be apart of a class that the so-called fans are bagging on !!!???

And considering 1 scholarship for all men this class is a killer !

Keep it in perspective and try to encourage not tear down !!!

With the Power 5 there will be unlimited scholarships. Schools will be jockeying around in entirely new conferences.

Hardy har har. Like at any school, one can find challenges at CU. However, to say it's academically brutal is ridiculous. There is an enormous number of out of state ski bums, studying very little, and smoking a lot of dope and dropping a lot of mushrooms. It's not the Harvard of the West-in fact it's probably not even the Harvard of Boulder County. That would be Naropa.

PACADEMIC-9 wrote:

CU is academically brutal. No wonder they can't get kids to show. CU is known for astronauts, NASA contacts, and STEM R&D. Overall the academics at PACADEMIC-9 campuses are suicide. Even at the four white public PACADEMIC-9 schools (ASU, UA, Utah, CU) so what if you had a 4.0 HS GPA with every AP class. That won't get you past the 1st mid-term unless you have the material down in the summer before the term begins. Literally the PACADEMIC-9 is that hard. At least at private South Central U & U of Stansucks you have peers watching your every move. But at the publics you are own your own. That at 18, with hormones raging, 1st time away from home. Bottom line if you aren't mature enough at the publics like CU, to study on your own, you are gone in the 1st term.

CU is no Harvard. The Pac-12 is no Ivy League. CU is a state school and has way more stoned out hippies than astronauts (it's sad that the astronauts will never get higher than the hippies). They have their share of distinguished faculty, but then again, so do most schools. That being said, Wetmore is a great coach and is able to develop a lot of lesser talents on paper than we see going to other schools (plus a lot of Colorado high school athletes go unnoticed in recruiting because their times are not as high on the list as a lot of lower elevation kids). And I hope that who ever posted on Naropa was being facetious. In order to stay academically eligible at Naropa you have to maintain a minimum THC level.

It's not that CU is so good academically, it's that oregon is so horribly, astonishingly, shockingly terrible

oregon is on the same level as a Mississippi juco

PACADEMIC-9 wrote:

CU is academically brutal.

So true. Colorado's 86 ranking in US News is tied with the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry and the University of Tulsa.

Also, it's not always about the PRs coming in; how do they fit into the program? Are they trainable? What's their character like?

In this sport of distance running, it ain't all about the PR; it's about consistency over the long haul - and when you're talking about team titles, there's a lot more that goes into it.