Duke NOT racing full team - forfeits men's and women's races at regionals

Where would you recommend this explanation then? To come out and justify every action that is done internally through the coaches/team/ad and then to answer every and any scrutinizing by people who have no association to the program? That is ridiculous. I've yet to see a press release from any of the coaches who sat out runners from their regional meet who ran at the conference. Most likely they are saving them from nationals. Why are they allowed to sit out their top runners and qualify with other athletes only to be replaced at the national meet? Obviously it is a great stategic coaching move if you have the quality and talent. However, the runners that ran at regionals justifiably deserve to run instead at the national meet since they helped their team qualify right?

You're comments are some of the same reasons a lot of these athletes are performing the way they are. You feel a sense of entitlement when you have not earned one, nor deserve one. Just because mommy and daddy told you that you have tried your best or they gave you everything you wanted when you asked for it, does not mean the world should just give it to you. Come with some credibility and you will receive answers.

In my opinion, I don't care why they did what they did. Being a former coach I always find it hard to believe that people who have no clue about a program or the process feel they are the experts. I can promise you that if they still put together a full team and ran as poorly as they would have, you would still come on here with something negative to say. You need a reason to always complain or feel like you know better. As long as the coaches, athletes, and the administration know and support what has happened; then you just have to live with it.

Before you have time to make any grammatical changes or point out errors, I will say I wrote this fast response just to amuse you.

It's small-time, and would never happen in other division I sports, even in the non-revenue sports. If it wouldn't be acceptable for a baseball team or a hockey team to do it, it shouldn't be acceptable for a cross-country team.

Do you not follow any other sports? It happens, not all the time, but fairly often in football and basketball. Don't you remember when UK passed on playing in the NIT because it felt the NIT was beneath it or when ND passed on a lesser bowl because it felt the bowl was beneath it? I'm not saying that it's good or right when it happens in other sports but get off your f'ing high horse by acting like this is completely without precedence because this is nothing new in the NCAA.

So, this is not a case where people are nit-picking about a coach decision to run so and so over another so and so in a meet, this is an instance where people who actually care about the sport would like some insight as to why a major academic and athletic power, Duke, did not field a team in either gender in what is a national qualifier race.

Seems very fair to me, or are you satisfied with this "explanation" in the official press release shown in this thread previously:

"Despite the fact they will not be competing as a full team, the Blue Devils are still confident they can make some noise in this weekend's race.

"[Our runners] all have the potential to be All-Region, womens head coach Christine Engel said. The ideal is to have them all set a [personal record]. Training has been going exceptionally well, so we are looking forward to them representing our program in a strong fashion. "

Gawd.

BigDaddyWooWoo wrote:

http://www.goduke.com/SportSelect.dbml?SPID=1831&SPSID=22403

Rosters

women 21

men 25

total 46

total left behind 40!

THIS!!!!!! This is the telling statistic.

This is great recruitment fodder.......for WAKE FOREST.

Surprised Duke even ran conference.

If you'd quoted my full post, you would see I was calling attention to the fact that Duke didn't show up without any explanation, not just that they didn't show up. When Notre Dame chose not to go to a bowl game, they explained why. When a college basketball team leaves their backup shooting guard at home for a road trip, they explain why. If a fourth-string offensive tackle doesn't dress for a Duke football game, you can find out why. But in cross-country and track too many programs make no effort to explain anything. Then they wonder why those programs get little to no support.

Also, UK didn't skip the NIT, they just got their butts kicked by Robert Morris.

113 wrote:

If you'd quoted my full post, you would see I was calling attention to the fact that Duke didn't show up without any explanation, not just that they didn't show up. When Notre Dame chose not to go to a bowl game, they explained why. When a college basketball team leaves their backup shooting guard at home for a road trip, they explain why. If a fourth-string offensive tackle doesn't dress for a Duke football game, you can find out why. But in cross-country and track too many programs make no effort to explain anything. Then they wonder why those programs get little to no support.

Also, UK didn't skip the NIT, they just got their butts kicked by Robert Morris.

My bad. You are right. After hemming and hawing, UK begrudgingly did accept its NIT bid only get get hammered by RM at home. However, there are plenty of other schools to have turned down NIT bids. NC State, Arkansas and Georgetown come to mind.

Why does a XC program have to make a public explanation for this when it doesn't make a public explanation on anything else? You are comparing ND football to Duke XC???? You are aware that ND football has an entire media relations office and explains everything it does every week. Even the Duke football team has a media relations office and does countless press conferences every week explaining everything. Name one XC program that has even a smidgeon of the media/PR resources of any BCS football team. Do you really think that there is a XC program that does press conferences with reporters asking questions each week about x, y and z?

You further show your ignorance by claiming that the reason XC doesn't get the funding you think it should is because programs don't explain everything to the public. Don't you think the fact that they are cost centers that nobody cares about (how many people pay to attend XC races?) might have a little bit more to do with that?

The bottom line is that you are completely off your rocker if you think that a XC program owes you, random anonymous guy lurking on the internet, an explanation for anything. The kids in the program better have been told what the reason was but there hasn't been a single person on here claiming that that wasn't the case.

Look, I get your point about XC not being college hoops or football with a fandom base with an insane need for hyper-info, but how about this: this site at its best wants to know what happened because we actually care about these athletes and the sport: were there injuries, if so how can they be avoided, what is the future for program after this, was the coaching transition really disruptive, did people get sick, etc?

I as a coach want to know so that I can learn from what happened and maybe learn something.

I know an athlete on the team by acquaintance but I am reluctant to ask her about it to respect the privacy of the team. That is why it is important to have a person in charge like the coach to officially and publicly talk about what happened in just a bit more detail.

Also, an NCAA XC regional race is not like the NIT tournament, sorry. WAY more important.

BCSBS wrote:

Why does a XC program have to make a public explanation for this when it doesn't make a public explanation on anything else? You are comparing ND football to Duke XC???? You are aware that ND football has an entire media relations office and explains everything it does every week. Even the Duke football team has a media relations office and does countless press conferences every week explaining everything. Name one XC program that has even a smidgeon of the media/PR resources of any BCS football team. Do you really think that there is a XC program that does press conferences with reporters asking questions each week about x, y and z?

God forbid a division I XC program would actually try to keep fans and followers engaged. You don't need a PR staff to explain why you aren't running at regions. Their SID already published two articles previewing the regional race; how hard would it be to just add one sentence: "The remainder of the varsity team will not travel to regionals due to injuries/academic concerns/suspensions etc."?

Iowa State didn't run Crystal Nelson at regions. They needed exactly one sentence to explain why:

Sure, they could have left it unexplained. They actually seem to appreciate having fan interest, though, so they try to offer an explanation for the moves they make. Doesn't seem that difficult.

113 wrote:

Iowa State didn't run Crystal Nelson at regions.

Your entire post is invalidated by this incorrect statement. That's just how LetsRun works.

pilbooster wrote:Also, an NCAA XC regional race is not like the NIT tournament, sorry. WAY more important.

Very funny and thank you for demonstrating how clueless you are. Remind me again what channel the regionals were shown live on national television and also remind me again how much revenue these regionals generated for the schools competing. NOBODY cares about NCAA XC regionals other than the friends/family of those competing and a few thousand running nerds.

My school, which I am afraid to name now, is a highly academic (not as much as Duke) and big budget (way more than Duke) athletic department. We didn't recruit as well as Duke, but we never sent a single woman to regionals for at least 3 years. We could take 9 to XC conference but never in four years took that many. We could put 4 in each event in track and rarely did that either, and never had more that 2 in any middle or distance event (runners that might score).It's not the same as basketball because in a tournament if one team forfeits there is no game. As an XC fan I only care about the teams and runners up front. This is only a big deal because the fact that the quality of recruits is so high and the output is so low. Just be honest and say that rather than making up some fundamental right of fans to see lesser runners.

BCSBS wrote:

pilbooster wrote:Also, an NCAA XC regional race is not like the NIT tournament, sorry. WAY more important.

Very funny and thank you for demonstrating how clueless you are. Remind me again what channel the regionals were shown live on national television and also remind me again how much revenue these regionals generated for the schools competing. NOBODY cares about NCAA XC regionals other than the friends/family of those competing and a few thousand running nerds.

BCSBS,

By your logic XC shouldn't exist at all: no "revenue" generation. Jesus. Is this what we have come to in college athletics?

I think people who care about running are interested in this decision, but more importantly I think the athletes on the Duke roster care about this.

Cross Country is not a collegiate sport recognized by ADs. There are no cross country scholarships. Its a glorified pre-season to keep distance runners in shape for track.

George Atlas wrote:

Cross Country is not a collegiate sport recognized by ADs. There are no cross country scholarships. Its a glorified pre-season to keep distance runners in shape for track.

Why wouldn't XC be important to ADs? There is an NCAA championship to be won. If they just want to have a pre-season track program they can just have a pre-season track program and not fly their team to Boston and Wisconsin for meets that the AD doesn't care about.

Northwestern does the opposite of this: They have women's XC but no track program. That's how you run a program if you only care about one season.

113 wrote:

God forbid a division I XC program would actually try to keep fans and followers engaged.

Iowa State didn't run Crystal Nelson at regions. They needed exactly one sentence to explain why:

http://www.cyclones.com//ViewArticle.dbml?ATCLID=209762480&DB_OEM_ID=10700

Sure, they could have left it unexplained. They actually seem to appreciate having fan interest, though, so they try to offer an explanation for the moves they make. Doesn't seem that difficult.

You are a CLOWN and not a fan, Crystal Nelson did run the Regional Meet. The fact that you didn't know this proves how much of a NON FAN you are. %th place and ran with Katy Moen to assure them the Regional title. Why did the SID at Iowa State produce a pre race article saying she wouldn't be running? Why no explanation afterward? Hopefully you realize that the SID at Iowa State was playing the game without explanation.

George Atlas wrote:

Cross Country is not a collegiate sport recognized by ADs. There are no cross country scholarships. Its a glorified pre-season to keep distance runners in shape for track.

uninformed comment - i know for a fact there are XC scholarships and my son's school does not run official Winter or Spring track seasons

messi wrote:

BigDaddyWooWoo wrote:http://www.goduke.com/SportSelect.dbml?SPID=1831&SPSID=22403

Rosters

women 21

men 25

total 46

total left behind 40!

THIS!!!!!! This is the telling statistic.

This is great recruitment fodder.......for WAKE FOREST.

Surprised Duke even ran conference.

If I'm the coach at Wake Forest, I'm loving this. Not only will any serious athlete consider Wake a better choice for the next 2-3 years, with the academic scandal at UNC, its easy to get athletes who would consider there too. Expect Wake and NC State to be the top teams in NC for the next 5 years.

If I'm the coach at Wake Forest, I'm pretty freakin depressed because I coach one of the worst teams in the ACC, with no hope for a conference title in the next 20 years. I'm also having a hard time paying my bills because of the weak salaries they pay their coaches. I probably feel like I'll never get a better job because I coach at Wake Forest and nobody thinks I can recruit for shlt. If you think the academic scandal at UNC is going to factor into a decision made by an athlete that can actually have an impact you've not paid much attention to the teams who've been kicking your a$$ for the last 100 years. Maybe having a higher team GPA makes you feel like you've won some little personal victory, but trust me your AD doesn't agree and neither do the boosters. BTW isn't UNC sending both teams to Terre Haute? And from the looks of their recent signing classes they'll be ahead of Wake Forest for a long time to come. They actually didn't have a single athlete back out of their NLI agreement in the wake of that academic scandal.

No "serious" athlete is going to consider Wake forest at all. 11th place in the ACC and 10th at regionals is embarrassing. With the BIG 5 conferences splitting off I expect to see Wake Forest drop to a Div 2 school soon. They dropped to a Div 2 talent level a long time ago, might as well make it official.

.[/quote]

If I'm the coach at Wake Forest, I'm loving this. Not only will any serious athlete consider Wake a better choice for the next 2-3 years, with the academic scandal at UNC, its easy to get athletes who would consider there too. Expect Wake and NC State to be the top teams in NC for the next 5 years.[/quote]

Wesley Frazier is no longer on the Duke track and cross country roster. What's up with that?