Bad Last Day for UT Track Women...

#1

armchair

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#1
The Vols women's track program is not in great shape, but I think our new coach is a good one who will help it a lot. Today wasn't very encouraging, however--pay no attention to the PR on UTSports.com, which has a story raving about our women's 29th-place standing in the NCAA championship. On the last day of the championship, the UT sprinters performed poorly. First, our 4x100m relay team, which was not one of the favorites int the final, botched the final handoff and didn't even finish the race. We could have gotten one or two points, and instead got none.

In the 400M Final, Felecia Majors wasn't expected to be one of the top contenders, either--but she came in a DISTANT last, finishing something like 9 seconds behind the top finishers and about 7 seconds slower than her semifinal time. In a 51 second race, that's almost unheard of. She may have been injured--that's the only explanation.

I thought our best sprinter, Felecia Brown, was a real contender in the 200M race, but apparently not as she finished 6th.

Distant runner Chelsea Blase was our best performer in the NCAA finals--I think she came in second in the 10K m--and we'll miss her. We need to crank up our recruiting, big time, as we were no factor in field events and had very little depth in the track events. Onward and upward....
 
#3
#3
So where does your optimism in the new coach come from?

She's also the men's track coach and they finished 6th. But, I really think we lost a good one when we let Caryl Smith Gilbert get away. We should have done every thing in our power to keep her and make her head coach. But AC is right I do think our coach is a good one.
 
#4
#4
They seem improved over what the last coach accomplished. Hopefully they will continue the improvement. I think it probably takes a little more time to build a top ranked track program than some of the other sports.
 
#5
#5
It is really hard to hold the track coach accountable for performances when our program doesn't have a state of the art indoor facility. Really a shame for a program with such history and tradition. Victim of the budget woes.
 
#6
#6
The Vols women's track program is not in great shape, but I think our new coach is a good one who will help it a lot. Today wasn't very encouraging, however--pay no attention to the PR on UTSports.com, which has a story raving about our women's 29th-place standing in the NCAA championship. On the last day of the championship, the UT sprinters performed poorly. First, our 4x100m relay team, which was not one of the favorites int the final, botched the final handoff and didn't even finish the race. We could have gotten one or two points, and instead got none.

In the 400M Final, Felecia Majors wasn't expected to be one of the top contenders, either--but she came in a DISTANT last, finishing something like 9 seconds behind the top finishers and about 7 seconds slower than her semifinal time. In a 51 second race, that's almost unheard of. She may have been injured--that's the only explanation.

I thought our best sprinter, Felecia Brown, was a real contender in the 200M race, but apparently not as she finished 6th.

Distant runner Chelsea Blase was our best performer in the NCAA finals--I think she came in second in the 10K m--and we'll miss her. We need to crank up our recruiting, big time, as we were no factor in field events and had very little depth in the track events. Onward and upward....

Majors was injured.

This was the first race all year that Brown didn't win, not sure if something happened to her. Her previous times at the SEC and other meets would have won her the NCAA meet, from what I understand.

Just like on the men's side, they have a good class coming in and some young runners they are developing.

The fact that Alford-Sullivan was able to turn around the men's program in such quick fashion from how terrible they were gives me hope that the women are not far behind.
 
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#7
#7
She's also the men's track coach and they finished 6th. But, I really think we lost a good one when we let Caryl Smith Gilbert get away. We should have done every thing in our power to keep her and make her head coach. But AC is right I do think our coach is a good one.

I agree that she is a very good coach and was instrumental in our success, but at the time Smith-Gilbert left for the head coaching job at UCF in 2007, it would have made very little sense to have elevated her to head coach here or done "everything to keep her."

Hindsight is 20/20, but when she left in 2007, J.J. Clark had just been named SEC Coach of the Year and was in the middle of an unbelievable run of success. It would not be until four years after she departed (and the track programs were combined under Clark) that the program began to slip. They won an SEC and National Championship indoors in 2009, two years after she left.

It's basically the same argument that Clark shouldn't have been given leadership of both programs. Obviously, looking back, that was a bad decision that didn't work out. But at the time he was given the whole program (which had to happen, UT was one of just two SEC track programs that were still separate), his women's team was coming off its second NCAA championship and 4th SEC title. If you were going to combine the programs, you certainly weren't going to find anyone more accomplished to do it.

When Clark was fired in 2014, Smith-Gilbert was the first call that the search committee made, but she declined because she had just completed her first season at Southern Cal and didn't want to bail on them.
 
#8
#8
It is really hard to hold the track coach accountable for performances when our program doesn't have a state of the art indoor facility. Really a shame for a program with such history and tradition. Victim of the budget woes.

i didn't realize that an expensive indoor facility would make kids run faster....did UT have 'state of the art' back when they were winning more? there's always an excuse isn't there?
 
#9
#9
i didn't realize that an expensive indoor facility would make kids run faster....did UT have 'state of the art' back when they were winning more? there's always an excuse isn't there?

Then you really don't know anything about competitive track.

When UT was a successful track program, yes, they had an indoor track where they could train and host indoor meets. As you're probably aware, Stokely was torn down two years ago and now they have no place to train.
 
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#10
#10
Not saying they're the greatest but I've seen better times from both Felicia's...it just seemed everyone was just out of sync...can't explain it...:crazy:

GO BIG ORANGE!
 
#11
#11
I like track & field, UT has a pretty good tradition in the sport--and so it was nice to see us make a bit of mark on the championship.

I know UTSports.com has to put a positive spin on all things UT sports, but the headline yesterday that the UT women "wrap up an impressive outdoor campaign" was a bit silly. That hed would have been true for the men, but not the women. Work to do.
 

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