I have a DS 2017 who is looking for a college, and wants to run mid and distance track. I saw this article that said that SBU is planning to add distance track in 2016, but didn’t find anything about that on the SBU website. Does anyone here know anything about this?
http://www.atlantic10.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=31600&ATCLID=210152293
(I asked this question at the St. Bonaventure forum but there’s not much traffic there, so I thought I’d try here too.)
Often the school websites are very out of date. You can contact the AD if no coach is mentioned in the article.
I read about my daughter’s school adding her sport in a news article on a sport specific website. I can’t remember if the questionnaire for recruits on the school’s website specifically listed her sport, but it got to the newly hired coach immediately and the coach contacted D even though coach wasn’t yet on campus (it was summer and she didn’t start at the school until the fall, after she had a baby and moved to the new school). Be prepared for a lot of ‘I don’t know’ answers at first since the coach probably won’t know the answers to questions about admissions, awards, number on the team, meets. Our coach knew very little about the school since she’d only been there a few weeks when we first visited and had a student along on the tour to answer things about dorms, classes, meal plans, etc.
It has been great for my daughter to be on a new team. She was prepared to lose a lot (it hasn’t been that bad!), but she gets a lot of playing time and really felt part of the program as a freshman.
@mdcmom, It sounds like Coach MacFarlane is basically going to be adding 5 or 6 spots to the xc team over the next couple years and extending the season to include outdoor track but only competing in the distance events. By competing in outdoor track meets it seems there will be a financial benefit to the school without incurring much additional expense.
MacFarlane’s email address is right on the website, you might want to drop him a note to see what this means for potential recruits.
I find it interesting that schools are allowed to count track as a sport without any participation in the sprints, jumps or throws, but St. Bonaventure isn’t alone in this approach.
DS visited SBU yesterday, and Coach MacFarlane happened to be in the admissions office lounge when he got there so they had a good talk. SBU’s plan is what varska said. They don’t seem to have a good track for indoor, though…they use a local high school’s track. But that doesn’t seem to be a deal breaker for DS so he must have liked the coach 
.