Cross Country Teams

[vu72]

I'm just wondering why we bother fielding Cross country teams.  Those athletes  can compete at the longer distances in track and probably do. We have zero commitment to the sport as our coach is a law professor and probably has other issues on his mind. The results also confirm the commitment.  We just competed at ND and finished dead last in both men's and women's.  Lost to major conference foes you might be thinking?  Sure.  But we also were beaten soundly by teams like Butler (on the women's side), Calvin and Wisconsin Stevens Point.  On the men's side it was no better, losing to the same teams.

I applaud the effort of our athletes but wonder whether the funds expended could be used in better places.  This is not a situation where we gain female over male athletes for Title 9 purposes.

Thoughts?   

[usc4valpo]

agreed

[Vinny]

You're right 72. And the same goes for swimming. I have to think the department would be better served with those funds going to facility upgrades or the Bryce Drew salary fund or anything else really. The cross country athletes could still compete in the spring with the track team.

[VULB#62]

CC is just a natural sequence for the indoor and outdoor track seasons. It is literally a drop in the bucket $$$$ wise so it is easy to maintain.  The amount saved by cancelling that program would be directed into the track program IMO, so other sports/facilities wouldn't really benefit. As far as enrollment impact, there probably isn't one as CC runners come mainly for track anyway. 

What with the new track and all, I sincerely hope that the T&F program's recruiting budget is increased to bring in more talented athletes (and the staff gets out there and actively recruits!). But if you cut CC, the money that could go to the T&F recruiting budget might be offset by being unable to recruit good distance runners who want to also run CC. Kind of a Catch 22. 

[VU2624]

Couple of things here. How much can the budget for the XC teams be? I don't think they travel far and the training facilities consist of a few pairs of shorts, spikes and a set of warmups some of which the athletes probably pay for. Even Div I power XC teams don't recruit for XC alone. The Colorado's, Stanford's, Oklahoma St. and Northern AZ programs recruit for track and use the distance guys for their XC programs.

Butler, mentioned, has a pretty decent history in XC so that school having some success is in no way a surprise.

Does the OP have some sort of predetermined bias vs. skinny men and women who just want to compete in collegiate athletics?

[Valpo89]

I have posted this before. My son was a very good runner while at Valparaiso High School. He earned 7 total letters in track and cross country. He was cross country MVP as a senior and finished 13th in the state in the 3,200-meter run in track as a senior in 9:23.64. Also a very good student with over a 4.0 GPA. He didn't even get a recruiting letter from the VU coaching staff. He didn't really want to stay in town and go to VU, but no one ever asked and if a deal could have been put together I'm sure it may have happened.

Aside from that, he is now running on the club team at IU-Bloomington. He trains with the team, but it's all voluntary and there are no real coaches. He ran a race today on a rainy course in Louisville. His time was 26:54 for 8K, which is 4.97 miles. The top VU times from Friday's meet at Notre Dame, listed as being five miles - 26:35, 26:47, 26:47 and 27:08. It's not like VU is attracting or even trying to recruit big-time talent. The coach is a nice enough guy and he's been dedicated for a very long time. We have PLENTY of local talent in NW Indiana. The top 15 times at today's DAC meet, for 5K, were all under 16:30 which is very good. You would think they would be able to recruit kids who would at least be competitive, particularly now that there is a beautiful track on campus.

[VULB#62]

89, I think that's the key -- active, dedicated recruiting.  At the high school level, T&F coaches develop whatever talent they have at hand within the community.  At the college level that changes to recruit first, then develop the natural talent you recruited.  It doesn't look (to me at least) that the track staff is the type who are sales people and dedicated recruiters.  Many track people are introverts (not a bad thing) who are individualistic in their frame of reference, and in many cases academically oriented.  They make great engineers and accountants.  With exceptions of course, engineers and accountants generally can't be bothered with marketing and sales.  But recruiting is all about marketing and sales.  So, we hear little about even self-promotional stuff within the university family. Can't imagine what is going out to prospects or how wide the recruiting net is being cast much less follow-up and developing relationships with recruits.

[valporun]

When I was running for Coach Straubel, we had large rosters, and mostly traveled close to home for meets. The only times we really flew anywhere was in 2001 because the conference meet was being hosted by Southern Utah, so we had a meet scheduled to run in the altitude, then September 11th happened, and that meet was out for us. Coach then took the top 7 men and top 7 women to a meet at the University of Denver. During those years, he was doing a lot of recruiting, and we did get a few of those recruits, but some of the "sale" of the program is also on the team to say, "Hey! We know you're a good runner, and having you here would really help out team. You've seen how we all get along and hang out together. Do you want to be a teammate of ours?" Do the current athletes do this?

I know that Tyler Wingard spent a couple days in September typing up letters to all returning high school seniors from all 50 states' track state meets from the previous May or June. That was a lot of letters, and many of those athletes visited, and even though we didn't have a track, they still came because the student-athletes on the team took the responsibility to sell the program for the coaches. Now, I don't know what happens with any of that, including sending out letters or having campus visits. I just don't understand why our rosters are so small and look like we're the Indiana version of Chicago State track and cross country.

[valpo64]

If memory serves me rightly, in the early 1960's, VU had a diminutive  distance runner from Kenya or somewhere on the African continent that  was a contender for the NCAA  Championship in cross-country.  I believe his name was Mike Urio.  I think c-c was  a competitive sport for us in those years.  Mike was short, and weighed about 110 pounds I think.  He lived on my floor in Wehrenberg(spell) and I remember him talking about how he trained in Africa.  He also was a good student.  If he had to, I think he could run for days at a time.

[VULB#62]

If memory serves me rightly, in the early 1960's, VU had a diminutive  distance runner from Kenya or somewhere on the African continent that  was a contender for the NCAA  Championship in cross-country.  I believe his name was Mike Urio.  I think c-c was  a competitive sport for us in those years.  Mike was short, and weighed about 110 pounds I think.  He lived on my floor in Wehrenberg(spell) and I remember him talking about how he trained in Africa.  He also was a good student.  If he had to, I think he could run for days at a time.

Mike Urio indeed.  He, together with Leeroy Schram and a number of other great distance runners, were recruited and developed by Darrell Zimmerman who, in 1965, took a job at University of the Pacific and what was then a D-I program. Coach Zim went on to be associated with some of the great west coast coaches of our time and was active in the USTFF and the USOC. That VU CC team is in the Valpo Athletics Hall of Fame. Coach Zim was also a FB coach at the same time he was coaching CC and track.  He approached T&F and CC like he coached football -- very energetic, very proactive -- and constantly pushed all his athletes.  He also recruited hard (for that period).

[SanityLost17]

Hire somebody new and VU could be a powerhouse in CC!  It is an inexpensive sport and there is plenty of talent to be had if you hire a motivated coach.

Sunset Hill farm is a great practice facility, as well as Rogers Lakewood park.  Lots of places to plan challenging workouts on grass.     

I have posted this elsewhere as well.  I have had a ton of talent come through my program over the last 6 years and none of them are ever recruited by VU.  Most of them are strong christian athletes with fantastic grades who are looking for a smaller school.  The fact that VU never even contacts them is absolutely insane.

Hire James Kearney from Lewis University or Josh Wolfe from Indiana Tech.  Both are close personal friends of mine.  They would have the program up and running, no pun intended, in about 3 years.     

[bbtds]

We still have cross country? I really thought it was dropped. Mainly to make room for a bigger T & F program.

[justducky]

We still have cross country? I really thought it was dropped.

Not sure how tung in cheek this comment is  but I agree with 72 in that you might as well drop a program rather than sleepily settle for sub mediocrity.


Cross country recruiting is a game best played by young, aggressive types who still have the fire in their bellies. Once that fire has died success rarely happens unless that coach can hire an assistant or assistants to do the recruiting for him. Either way it would seem to be decision time. So either commit to success or go back to sleep for another 12 months.

[Vinny]

It's puzzling as to why cross country and swimming are both still around. Not only did cross country lose to every single other team this past weekend, but swimming got curbstomped by Lewis (??) as well. When you can't beat D2s and D3s as a D1, it's time to stop the charade. Plain and simple.

[Crew-Sader]

From what I know, the AD has told people within the track program that Coach Straubel will be the coach for as long as he wants. He will never be fired, as bad as the track side wants him gone. His athletes don't do anything for the track side, and I believe on the guys side they brought in 0 points for the conference outdoor meet. He has no motivation and does very minimal recruiting as you everyone has already mentioned. It terms of recruiting, it is always difficult and will be interesting to see how they do this year with the coaching change. Yes the program could be successful, but I think it starts at the top with the AD wanting to put forth the effort to have the program be successful. As far as I know, the AD doesn't care how the cc/track does as long as they are providing an experience for the student-athlete. He couldn't care less if they contend for a conference championship or not.

[FWalum]

From what I know, the AD has told people within the track program that Coach Straubel will be the coach for as long as he wants. He will never be fired, as bad as the track side wants him gone. His athletes don't do anything for the track side, and I believe on the guys side they brought in 0 points for the conference outdoor meet. He has no motivation and does very minimal recruiting as you everyone has already mentioned. It terms of recruiting, it is always difficult and will be interesting to see how they do this year with the coaching change. Yes the program could be successful, but I think it starts at the top with the AD wanting to put forth the effort to have the program be successful. As far as I know, the AD doesn't care how the cc/track does as long as they are providing an experience for the student-athlete. He couldn't care less if they contend for a conference championship or not.

How well do you know the AD? Pretty strong words for someone I suspect does not know Mark LaBarbera.