William and Mary Head Coach GONE

CircleofChub wrote:

Gibby and Gerard had a period where they were getting a large percentage of the in state talent without even recruiting that hard. The performance of the program recruited itself.

Look at the spike in performance Va Tech has had since Walsh arrived and the number of quality of in-state kids they get.

What blue chip instate guys did Walsh land in his time there?

I would think Gibby would already be in contact unless his departure did not go well but not sure W&M could hold an offer at UMich against him.

He did get a McGorty. You'd think with an older brother that can run 3:53, 7:48, and 13:24, and a younger brother who went 1:48 at age 17, he should be able to produce more than 1:55.99 and 3:51 for 1500.

My brother was a bit of a screw up in highschool, actually dropped out after his junior year. 6 years later he got a GED, then went to a VA community college for 2 years, followed by 4 years at George Mason undergrad, then Law School at William and Mary. He had heard a lot of the same things about W&M before going there, but his observation was that the school just attracts a certain type of neurotic individual. Everyone was very stressed about grades and assignments, but the course load was very light and the classes were a breeze.

Maybe undergrad is a little different, but I have known my brother for 30+ years, he is no genius and he said many of his 101 level courses at Mason were tougher.

I graduated from undergrad there a year ago.

It's definitely not as tough as everyone who goes there makes it out to be, but everyone who goes there makes it out to be very tough.

It's true that there are maybe only 2 easy classes in the entire school. And there are lots of very hard classes. It's definitely more work than many other schools. And it has much less return. It doesn't get the respect of UVA or Vanderbilt, but is definitely a bit more work (based on what friends and transfers have told me) and a lot less fun.

Still, the main problem would be the overall culture of almost everyone at the school being an insufferable nerd.

W&M definitely scares away a lot of good athletes because of its atmosphere and work load. Not many athletes who want to have a good time in school are going to go to William and mary. They will much prefer a school that's more of a party school.

Flagpole, are you amazed as I am as to how some posters, based on your post, have determined that you and/or your son are high maintenance, spoiled, crybabies, etc....

Why not just read your points and agree or disagree with them, or discuss further, or state why somethings are they way they are....

I see your points, and agree about the websites... I at times look at track and field websites for certain work I perform, and do find many hard to navigate, containing bear minimum information, outdated, etc. For example, I sometimes try to find results of a meet that the school host, and cannot find a link anywhere. I have to do a web search for xyz invitational to find the info. This should be on the schools website. Or the info about an athlete is nothing more than a picture.

Coaches are typically not in charge of this. It is usually the webmaster and/or sport information director (sometimes this is the same person). BUT, the coach has an influence, he/she can review the website and request more of this or that...

Sometimes the athletes themselves fill out a card for personal records, schools, etc, and then the SI director fills in the website template...., but sometimes the athlete fills out this bio sheet poorly

OK, on to William and Mary

Has this been a fully funded program over the years? Seems like it has been primarily a distance school. Does the school excel in track and field, or more just in cross country and the distance side of T&F? I see they have a pretty good hsitory at the NCAA XC Champs. In track, seems like the school has had a lot of outstanding middle distance and distance runners over the years, but never really more than 1 or 2 at a time. Past athletes I can think of are Sean Graham, Matt Lane, Andres Christiansen, Paul Vandegrift, Brian Hyde, Howel Michael (70's)... Who am I forgetting?

well you're definitely forgetting Christo Landry that's for sure

Going to pretend I am a current student-athletes at William & Mary and will allow my mind to envision who might be hired here. How would the following hires do and what are the chances?

Connection

Solinsky - there and a huge name in didstance obviously.

Gibby - been there and always built men's xc (current job sux)

Graham - been there and Kentucky has shown some progress

Dunn - rumors out at Oklahoma true? Has wife too for women's side of things.

Area

Seaton - at NC State; sick of waiting for Geiger to retire.

Gary's - at Furman; if get going at Furman, can get going at similar school (not sure how elite team fits in elsewhere?)

Head CC coaches at North Carolina, Virginia, or Va Tech would all be great, but that seems like a step back?

Kevin Jermyn still around, interested in coaching?

I would agree that W&M certainly attracts a neurotic individual. That is for certain. I think, at least in-state, it attracts the type of person who is put off/ afraid of the social scene at UVA and wants the appearance that they are going to school that expects more academically.

I transferred myself, from the University of Washington. I had a 3.85 my first year at UW (no A+), not studying much except for doing the projects and the day or two before midterms and finals. I got in to both UVA and W&M transferring and chose W&M partly because it felt more focused on academics. (Maybe I am one of those neurotic individuals... but man, there were people way worse than me there. Always stressed, etc.)

Anyway,it was a different ballgame at W&M. Granted I was also doing crew, but I studied what I thought was a lot my first year there and had like a 3.3 first semester and a 2.7 second semester. I started taking English classes that spring semester--3 of them--and each professor asked to conference with me after my first paper. One gave me a D. One a C. One a NG/Rewrite. The writing I was doing at UW, a very good state school itself, writing papers in the few days before they were due, just was not good enough at W&M. But, I stuck with it, went to tutors, ended up an English major with a 3.4.

From time to time, especially as someone who had very good LSAT scores, I wonder if it was worth it. Had I stuck at UW and been a 3.8 student, or been a 3.6 student at UVA, I know I would have gotten into better law schools, top 10 instead of top 20. But, I did very well in law school because I came in a much better writer and a much better studier for lack of a better word than my peers. I became a writing tutor in law school and it, frankly, was appalling at, to me, how bad the writing of 1Ls was at this top 20 law school. At the clerkship and firms I've been at since I have always been regarded as an excellent writer.

This is not to brag, but to provide perspective as to the long-term benefits and consequences of going to a school like W&M. I'd consider it more like NE Liberal Arts schools than anything else. Your grades will suffer and that may limit your choices and opportunities down the road, but if you commit to the process of what it takes to be successful at W&M, even if it is by no way successful by the measurables, there is a long-term payoff.

And socially, nine times out of ten I wish I'd gone to UVA.

And Ed Moran

Lenny Leonard wrote:

CircleofChub wrote:

Gibby and Gerard had a period where they were getting a large percentage of the in state talent without even recruiting that hard. The performance of the program recruited itself.

Look at the spike in performance Va Tech has had since Walsh arrived and the number of quality of in-state kids they get.

What blue chip instate guys did Walsh land in his time there?

I would think Gibby would already be in contact unless his departure did not go well but not sure W&M could hold an offer at UMich against him.

He did get a McGorty. You'd think with an older brother that can run 3:53, 7:48, and 13:24, and a younger brother who went 1:48 at age 17, he should be able to produce more than 1:55.99 and 3:51 for 1500.

That's just mean to Middle McGorty. Siblings aren't always equally talented. And he did improve his 1500 much more in college this year than his 1600 had been in high school.

Agreed!! - I think Ryan's times are inline with what his HS performances would predict....

Both bothers are rare in their abilities.

W&M gets an unfair reputation as an unduly hard school. It is true that there is grade deflation, not inflation, and that professors expect a lot from students. That said, to characterize the school as being made up of neurotic eggheads is overblown. The posters who have been commenting on this don't seem to have a grasp of the athlete community - how could they? They rowed or were grad students. They were not student-athletes themselves. The community of student-athletes is incredibly tight - most of the teams mix and mingle for parties as well as in classes and for tutoring and assistance. The W&M community itself is a really special one - the athletic community even more so. To those wishing they'd gone elsewhere, I say the grass is always greener.

As far as I'm concerned, the athletes there want Solinsky. Any major control or influence he's had in their training has been for a short period of time and since then many runners have seen large improvements.

Bringing in Solinsky was the second best thing Walsh did for the program. The best thing he did was deciding to leave. He is a better man for it and I respect the decision on his part. It's not easy to walk away from something you had a large part in bringing down, especially when the administration would never fire you.

Solinsky does have the ability to revive the program and what makes that even better is that the athletes trust him and themselves to do so also.

Let the rise of the Tribe begin.

I heard the best athletes in VA wouldn't even return Solinsky's calls given how bad the program has become. If they saw him as the coach then, why would they return his calls now or believe he could revive the program. Not to mention the fact that he has less than 3 years of coaching experience...

1) Yes, I am amazed. People don't seem to have reading comprehension skills. I was clearly providing that information as a service about what I discovered during our research, not complaining that coaches were not giving my kid warm fuzzies.

2) The buck stops with the head coach. If I were a head coach of a program and the web site weren't up to snuff, I would know the reason why immediately, and steps to fix the problem would be made immediately.

3) I'm not as concerned with how the athletes did in high school...that information is fine and good, but those college teams need to have little summaries of each athlete's seasons in college. "Smith ran a PR of 13:48 in the 5,000 meters at the XYZ Championships". "Davis walked on to the team in 2014, lowered his high school 800 PR of 1:58.6 to 1:50.4 as a sophomore for the Fighting Elephants and became a scholarship athlete." "15 of the 16 returning men recorded PRs at the league championship meet, and the one who didn't was battling an addiction to Cyndi Lauper. We expect he will be back at full strength for indoor." Wilson - College PRs: 800 - 1:52, 1500 - 3:43 -- etc. etc. etc.

People form even subconscious bad feelings about a school or program if things are made difficult when they are trying to get information.

It's time for a change of guard. Recruits need to believe they are joining something NEW and on the RISE!

Thank you for your input Chris

Flagpole, you are mostly right. You said 100 percent. I'll say 98 percent. The only issue with your post is the information about "and became a scholarship athlete." It is not professional to mention that stuff IMO.

High school kids need to understand that scholarship money isn't always about their worth to the team. There are situations where more scholarship money can't be offered due to previous promises, etc. You don't want some kid thinking I'm not worth what this guy is worth even though I've run X and X. "Scholarship athlete" can be a wide range of things in track/xc. We had lots of kids at my school that were on tiny scholarships because they had good GPAs. So in that case I guess you can brag about them now being a scholarship athlete. But it would be misleading to most.

Matt Kerr (from Boston College) has been offered the position.

Look for big things to come

I can live with 98 percent right...I mean, it might keep me up for 2 minutes 38 seconds tonight, but I will survive it.

I don't care too much about what kids think they are worth or comparing themselves to other athletes on the team as far as money goes, and I THINK most athletes don't care about that or that their parents don't care about that. College CAN BE expensive though, so it is fine to be concerned about the cost...just flat cost, not in relation to anyone else. This is why it behooves athletes to be the best students they can be...get some academic scholarship money so that you only need a smallish athletic portion. Also, if a very good athlete doesn't get great monetary offers from D1 schools (ones that give athletic scholarships) and they need money (some people are crazily wealthy), then it's time to perhaps use athletic talent to help get you accepted to one of the 62 colleges that offer full financial need...this includes all the Ivy League schools and most of the top colleges in the country, many of which are D3.