Boston College Men: 0 Points at ACC

Add to that winless in the ACC in men's hoops and football. Quite a streak.

Shannon Hays wrote:

Add to that winless in the ACC in men's hoops and football. Quite a streak.

So..what *are* they good at then?

This is actually the second year in a row BC has scored 0 at ACCs (we wrote about it in the Week that Was when it happened last year). I understand that they may have little to no scholarship money. But if you're the athletic department, why would you bother funding a team if you have no interest in making it even moderately competitive?

Here's what we wrote last year:

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/05/ncaa-winners-and-losers-the-sec-flexes-its-muscle-lots-of-fabulous-freshmen-and-mary-cain-isnt-the-only-one-struggling/

Jonathan Gault wrote:

This is actually the second year in a row BC has scored 0 at ACCs (we wrote about it in the Week that Was when it happened last year). I understand that they may have little to no scholarship money. But if you're the athletic department, why would you bother funding a team if you have no interest in making it even moderately competitive?

Here's what we wrote last year:

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/05/ncaa-winners-and-losers-the-sec-flexes-its-muscle-lots-of-fabulous-freshmen-and-mary-cain-isnt-the-only-one-struggling/

in a time when so many men's teams get cut due to "title 9" aka football $$$ to fund losing programs, can we please not suggest more men's teams be cut. Somebody has to lose. BC is probably in the wrong conference, that's what this means, not that they should stop funding a team.

Perharps they should invest in some pole vaulters.

It's there to likely stay compliant with NCAA regulations. They obviously don't care and care even less to start a new sport to also suck at instead.

No Men's track scholarships.

Damn Shame.

They were the top men's program in New England back in the day.

Jonathan Gault wrote:

This is actually the second year in a row BC has scored 0 at ACCs (we wrote about it in the Week that Was when it happened last year). I understand that they may have little to no scholarship money. But if you're the athletic department, why would you bother funding a team if you have no interest in making it even moderately competitive?

Here's what we wrote last year:

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/05/ncaa-winners-and-losers-the-sec-flexes-its-muscle-lots-of-fabulous-freshmen-and-mary-cain-isnt-the-only-one-struggling/

This is an unfortunate post. I would suggest the author lacks an understanding of the meaning and purpose of sport. Yes, if this was a revenue generating team, then it would be prudent to make sure they were competitive. But this is T&F. The young men on this team are reaping the rewards and lessons of team work, hard work, and sacrifice. The school is doing the right thing by offering these men an opportunity for growth. Good for BC.

Jonathan Gault wrote:

This is actually the second year in a row BC has scored 0 at ACCs (we wrote about it in the Week that Was when it happened last year). I understand that they may have little to no scholarship money. But if you're the athletic department, why would you bother funding a team if you have no interest in making it even moderately competitive?

Here's what we wrote last year:

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/05/ncaa-winners-and-losers-the-sec-flexes-its-muscle-lots-of-fabulous-freshmen-and-mary-cain-isnt-the-only-one-struggling/

I agree with others why are we encouraging schools to cut their program? Yeah it sucks they have 0 funding. I don't mean they have no scholarships I mean they have no funding from the school. Every cent that team spends has to come from fundraising. They work incredibly hard to raise the funds and the alumni open their wallets to keep the team as opposed to being cut.

Are you suggesting that another D1 team loses its program? I really don't understand this Jon.

You are right, BC doesn't care how the team performs. So why keep the team you ask? Well the academic rating is a big one, keeps up graduation rates. But what about just giving an opportunity to young men to compete? Is that such a bad thing?

Bottom line is indeed the bottom line. BC sold its soul for ACC football TV revenue. It sucks in b-ball ,too 0 and something in conference ..The ADs there pissed on track long time ago. BC hated in Ireland for coughing up names of past IRA members, as well.

Change its Fight song to For Shame from For Boston.

You mad, bro?

Is that the situation? That the school doesn't fund the team at all? Because if so, then credit to the alumni and the donors for keeping the program going.

I didn't say BC should cut the team. And obviously there's more to track and field than scoring points. With that said, this isn't high school, it's NCAA Division I athletics. As far as goals go, scoring points at conference is pretty high up the ladder for a track and field team.

My frustration lies more with the athletic department. I know BC just endured a rough year in the revenue sports, but they still get a piece of that nice ACC TV contract. Is revenue really so low that they can't throw any funds toward the track and field team when seemingly every other ACC team can afford to?

I think you should look at the coach. One of your former teammates at Dartmouth did a 5th year at BC and ended up running 20 seconds slower for a mile.

Sesamoiditis wrote:

I think you should look at the coach. One of your former teammates at Dartmouth did a 5th year at BC and ended up running 20 seconds slower for a mile.

I don't know anything about the coach. But I know the teammate you're referring to very well and can tell you the BC coach was not the reason he ran 4:20 last year.

Jonathan Gault wrote:

Is that the situation? That the school doesn't fund the team at all? Because if so, then credit to the alumni and the donors for keeping the program going.

I didn't say BC should cut the team. And obviously there's more to track and field than scoring points. With that said, this isn't high school, it's NCAA Division I athletics. As far as goals go, scoring points at conference is pretty high up the ladder for a track and field team.

My frustration lies more with the athletic department. I know BC just endured a rough year in the revenue sports, but they still get a piece of that nice ACC TV contract. Is revenue really so low that they can't throw any funds toward the track and field team when seemingly every other ACC team can afford to?

Of course the goal is to score points at conference. Its not like the team isn't trying. BC funds more sports teams than anyone else in the ACC. That is why they can have all this money coming in and not fund their track team. Obviously Title IX has its role to play. The girls team has 12 scholarships I believe. But the issue is they fund hockey and winter sports too. Girls hockey eats up a ton of money but the location of the school means it makes sense for them to have girls hockey (they also went to the championship game this year). But that's a sport that no one else in the ACC would have or fund so strongly. Maybe Cuse? But they also fund baseball that Cuse doesn't.

I am not saying there aren't problems with BC track. (the coach is problem number 1) but at their peak I think they can be top 10 in the ACC in XC and score points but probably come in last in the ACC each year in track. that's just the way it is.

I could be completely off here, but another issue with the mens BC T&F / XC programs is small size of the team. It seems like they don't allow walk-ons and are entirely dependent on their recruiting abilities to build a team.

Why not change the culture of the program, allow more walkons and start trying to develop some of the scrubs floating around the campus.

There may be a way to develop a decent and better (not top) team by having a large stable of hard working athletes supported by good coaching. I mean it can't get any worse and clearly BCs strategy of recruiting middling kids new englands and california who are most likely using T&F as a way into BC is not working.

Jonathan Gault wrote:

Is that the situation? That the school doesn't fund the team at all? Because if so, then credit to the alumni and the donors for keeping the program going.

I would be very surprised if they didn't AT LEAST get the NCAA sponsorship fund check for their sports. That's about $35k per sport in D1, so $105k/yr. Which is more than my D1 track budget.

Throw in they don't need to leave Boston indoors or New England for XC and it seems like a fine situation. Maybe not at the ACC level, but enough to be respectable - which I think they are for a non-scholarship team. They would be competitive in the NESCAC.

If they get those checks stolen from them for other sports, then bravo for even having a team annually.

Another issue is the cost to attend the college itself. Without scholarships, this is an extra issue. There is no in-state tuition. They essentially have to target the top 10%(wealth-wise) in recruiting. Anyone else don't even bother.

BC is not the only school in this boat where they don't get funding from the school and the team has to rely on fundraising and alumni support. I believe UMass is in the same boat with their men's team. When I was there, I had heard rumors about how the athletic department was trying to starve out the team in order to cut it but the alumni has been supporting the team. Now I know they do get some scholarship money but the coach splits them up and focuses on the long distance athletes since they could do three sports (which was why the team was so distance heavy and had hardly any sprinters or field event athletes in the 2000s). Now they are in the Atlantic 10 conference, which isn't nearly as intense as the ACC and they don't have football, so it could be a hard sell to the athletic department to switch.

Feel free to correct me if UMass is not in this boat - I was only on the women's team for one year so I could be misremembering.

I don't know about UMass. But even a couple scholarships are huge along with in state tuition. An extra $5k could be the difference of where a kid goes.

And looking at the UMass roster, the kid Grouleau might be able to score in the 1500m in the ACC. Maybe. So its not that much of an improvement...