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PostPosted: Sun Oct 06, 2002 8:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It was hilly, but the conditions were good enough that if you ran a smart race you could turn in some good times. As most of my runners did. Especially when compaired to the slow coarses and conditions we've been running into this season. The first 400 meters of the coarse was up hill. So I told my kids the starting line is at the bottom of the hill but the race starts at the top. They ran smart and it payed off, teams that tried to get out hard (presummably to get in good position for the long stretches of hilly trail in the race) really paid the price, especially with a tough last 1k. I was pretty pleased with the times we ran, but we will go to Fort Hays (where my women are the defending champs, and might have a chance for a winning streak) where the coarse is flat and fast. So if we run well we should be able to turn in some fast times. Of coarse I've noticed that when you go looking for fast times they're a little harder to come by than when you just go out and try to race as best you can.

And how 'bout them D2 teams this weekend! Abilene giving Arkansas a scare at OSU cominging in second 31 to 38 with only 13 seconds difference in team time. And Western State actaully beating CU at Boulder 29 to 30!
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Dan
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PostPosted: Sun Oct 06, 2002 8:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Way to represent, D2!

Dan
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PostPosted: Sun Oct 06, 2002 4:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Upon further review: Western might or might have beaten CU in both the men's and women's races by one pointthis weekend, or they might have lost by that same margine, depending on how you score it. If you count WSC's 8 and 9 runners then they win by 1 in both races. If you don't then they loose by that same one point margin. Either way you look at it you're a pretty dog gone good D2 team if you can put your 8 and 9 in front of the 5th runner for the 3rd (men) or 4th (women) ranked D1 team in the country. Of coarse in order to do that you apparently need a ton of forigen talent.

I wonder if I call up the Nebraska head coach if I could get him to admit that my conference is tougher than his? Because at least at the top it would appear that that is the case. Surprised
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Dan
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PostPosted: Sun Oct 06, 2002 5:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

That would be an interesting phone call to listen in on...

Just out of curiosity, why would you ever score 9 deep?? Are you talking displacement or actual scoring runners?

Dan
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Paul
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PostPosted: Sun Oct 06, 2002 10:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Quote:
Loper is actually short for Antelope

Coming back to this... Wouldn't the Lopes be more fitting? I don't recall ever hearing of an Anteloper... We've got the Lutes out in this area, but I'm not quite sure what that stands for... At least they had the sensibility not to call themselves the Luters (looters).


Quote:
Posted: 09 Sep 2002 11:44 Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't know what inspired the change from Lopes to Lopers. We've got lots of old pictures in the halls of our gym and in the back ground of a lot of them you can see Go Lopes signs. I think there was a chancellor back in the 80's that made the change. Although I don't know the whole story on why they made the change.
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...and the answer is:

http://www.lopers.com/Pressbox/whyLopers.htm
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Micah Ward
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 07, 2002 10:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great meet DG!!!!!!!!!

You and your runners are obviously doing something right up there.
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 07, 2002 2:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks everyone. Nice work finding that article Paul, looks like I should spend a little more time on my own website.

Dan what I meant was using 8 and 9 as displacers. Which of coarse would result in a two point swing depending on if were displacers or not.
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 07, 2002 4:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've seen a few discussions elsewhere about counting the 8/9 runners as displacers in this particular situation, but that leaves me no less mystified... I'm not aware of any cross country scoring system that goes beyond 6/7 for displacement scoring??? Where is this notion coming from with regards to the CU meet?

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 07, 2002 6:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've seen races where everyone was a displacer, open runners, incomplete teams, 8+ runners and all. Although those weren't big meets. More than anything though it probably comes from my (and others) amazment that a D2 team had 9 runners that can beat the #5 for a top 5 ranked D1 school.
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 07, 2002 7:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
I've seen races where everyone was a displacer, open runners, incomplete teams, 8+ runners and all.

Probably officials that didn't know any better or just didn't care...

Quote:
More than anything though it probably comes from my (and others) amazment that a D2 team had 9 runners that can beat the #5 for a top 5 ranked D1 school.

Reading other forums, I've seen a few other people voice that opinion. I look at it a bit differently, though (not that that will surprise anyone here Wink ). I'm not sure what DII scholarship and team size rules are like, but I know they're quite restrictive for DI from the roster size standpoint. It makes sense to me that non-DI schools are more likely to win out when depth becomes the measuring stick. It's the strength up front that I find most impressive, assuming we overlook the heavy foreign factor.

Dan
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coachd
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 08, 2002 6:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
I'm not sure what DII scholarship and team size rules are like, but I know they're quite restrictive for DI from the roster size standpoint. It makes sense to me that non-DI schools are more likely to win out when depth becomes the measuring stick.


I can assure you (as can DG, as well as any other DII, DIII or NAIA coach) that small schools face the same restrictions on scholarships as DI when it comes to cross-country/track.

In what way does it make sense that these smaller schools should win when it comes to depth. The further you go back in terms of team spots(#1, #2, #3 man, etc.) the much less likely that a DII team can hold its own against a DI. You may get one, two or even a few DII kids that can run with the DI teams...but finding five, six or seven (eight? nine?)--sorry Dan, your logic escapes me. Neither DI or DII schools can fund scholarships that far back on a team. So it comes down to walk-ons as far as developing depth. At CU, a typical walk-on might be a 9:30 2-miler out of high school...this a kid DG or I would kill for, but they would rather walk-on at a major program, train with top athletes and hope they develop into a varsity runner. For DG, me and other DII coaches, a typical walk-on is a 10:30 2-miler and is probably fighting for the sixth or seventh spot on the team. Sure, you see DII and DIII schools with 20-30 athletes---but you have a whole lot of 10:30 2-milers and 4:50 milers.

Western is unique in that they have sort of been "adopted" by the New Zealand national federation as a U.S. training base. They have had good results with athletes there and continue to encourage their top young runners to go there...some with financial support (i.e.--they don't need scholarship money).

I have to say you are pretty far off base to say it makes sense that non-DI teams are more likely to "win with depth".
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Dan
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 08, 2002 6:54 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I meant to emphasize roster size over scholarship spots, which I thought I did... DI schools face a lot of restrictions over how many athletes can be on the team, including walk-ons. I know not all coaches adhere to those rules, but those who do cannot carry a very large team, thus not much depth. Assuming DII does not face the same restrictions (I don't know if that's the case, but DIII doesn't, so I figure DII is somewhere in between), then there's nothing from stopping a team from carrying 5-10 extra runners that, while not top 5 caliber, are strong enough to run around the 8-10 spot and are numbers above and beyond what the DI school can carry. That is where depth comes into play in a make believe scoring system...

Focusing on number of scholarships or quality of walk-ons confuses the picture, as its the raw number of runners that is more important in a discussion of depth, which neither of those directly affects. Western has proven they can get as many good runners on a regular basis as nearly any other school in the country, so that makes quality a virtual non-issue here.

Does that make more sense?

Dan
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coachd
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 08, 2002 8:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sorry Dan, you are wrong...raw numbers is not the most important factor when discussiing depth. It is absolutely about the quality of athletes that make up a total team.

No coach; cross-country, football, baseball, golf, soccer...you name the sport--confuses this issue. When coaches talk about depth, they are not talking about numbers, but rather the quality of those numbers.

Have you ever heard a coach say, "Well, we don't have anybody who can break 30 minutes for 5 miles, but we've got 30 guys who can run 31-32, so we're real deep and that will give us a chance in the big meets."...or maybe the local college BB coach: " We're small and nobody can shoot, but our sheer numbers and depth should pull us through," gimme a break.

No DI school is limited in the size of roster spots available to a cross-country team to the point were sheer numbers would ever become an issue. Squad restrictions allow a DI school to take at least two full teams(14 athletes) to any meet if the meet allows it and the coach so chooses.

Now if a hypothetical meet were held in which say 5 teams of 5 were scored for every school....hmmmmm, maybe DIII Colorado College (with 25 runners) would beat DI CU (with 20 runners) in the fifth team race...but that is a ridiculous hypothetical.

If you truly compare roster sizes, you will find that in the real world DI schools generally have larger rosters than non-DI...this is purely budgetary---smaller schools often cannot afford to take everybody to a meet. The cost of meals, transportation and lodging eats away our budgets pretty fast. DI schools face this problem far less often.
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 08, 2002 9:13 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
raw numbers is not the most important factor when discussiing depth.

It is when the other factors, i.e. quality, are held fairly equal, which is the case here. The reasoning is a bit non-linear, admittedly, but there's nothing wrong with that... We know the two teams have comparable runners up front, so working backward from that point, the one with better depth beyond the scoring spots will logically be the deeper team. That has nothing to do with the quality up front, and the two only become related factors if the quality is not there in the first place!

DI teams may be able to carry two scoring squads worth of athletes, but I'm guessing rarely are more than 5-6 of those truly recruited athletes. The rest are walk-ons, maybe "books" athletes, and the level drops off dramatically after the scoring spots. A lot of smaller schools I've seen will be very even from about 4-15, which few DI schools other than Stanford can boast.

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PostPosted: Tue Oct 08, 2002 10:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The I can't say I've ever seen a good team that varies little from 4-15. NE Weslyan would be about as close as any team in that respect and there is still about 2 minutes between there 4 and their 15. Also as coachd talked about before many of these small schools actually loose athletes that they offer scholarship money too. I know coachd went after the runner that is now running #5 for UNM very hard but in the end he decided to walk on (at what then wasn't even a good D1) at a big school rather than take money to run at a smaller school. And this goes on at every small school out there, recruiting kids only to have them go to a bigger school and walk on.

And when you take into consideration the fact that CU puts much more pride into there walk on program than just about any where in the country (in every quick overveiw of the CU program I've seen they talk about Wettmore turning walk ons into All-Americans, and how almost every year they have athletes in their top seven that started as walk ons) this factor negates even further the notion that Western might some how have an edge in terms of depth over CU because of walk ons.
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