Time is not on Vin Lananna’s side.
Next Friday, Oct. 30, is the Pacific-10 Conference Championships to be held at Skylinks Country Club in Long Beach, Calif. Two weeks later, on Nov. 14, the Ducks will return to Springfield Country Club as hosts of the NCAA West Regionals. The NCAA Cross Country Championships are Nov. 23, and indoor track season will officially begin with the UW Indoor Preview on Jan. 16. The NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships begin on Mar. 12 in Fayetteville, Ark., and the very next week (Mar. 20) is the Oregon Preview at Hayward Field, the beginning of outdoor track and field season.
It’s a lot to digest. And with every passing day, these dates loom larger and larger.
We are roughly four weeks past Sep. 29, the first day of school and the day that associate director of track and field Dan Steele formally accepted the head coaching position of the Northern Iowa cross country and track and field teams. With the 2009 cross country season in its infancy, the timing could not have possibly been worse, and yet it looks more and more imposing as fall quarter progresses.
Lananna has been scouring the nation in pursuit of his next assistant director of track and field. No candidates have been formally named by the athletic department, and it is unclear how many have been interviewed by Lananna. His next director will have to be well-versed in multi-events competition — Steele is widely credited with the development of Ashton Eaton and Brianne Theisen into NCAA champions — with a keen eye for recruiting and a good existing rapport with Lananna.
To Lananna’s credit, he has built up Oregon’s name so much in the past five years that he is assured a foot in the door, if not an accepted offer. At the end of the day, of course, Lananna must sign off on all decisions regarding the track team — there is a reason his official title shifts to “assistant athletic director” as track season progresses. He is, to put it succinctly, very hands-on. This does not have to be an obstacle, but it could narrow the field of candidates.
Conventional wisdom suggests that Lananna will have his man (or woman) by Jan. 16 at the latest; he would probably feel better about the hire if he could wrap it up by Christmas. A progress report will be demanded of him at the impending Pac-10 Championships media day. The subject, among media members, may be brought up more often than the Ducks’ chances of taking home men’s and women’s conference crowns.
For the men, ranked No. 2 in the nation in the most recent U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association poll, those chances look good; the battle with top-ranked Stanford on Oct. 30 will be passionately fought by both sides. The women saw their national ranking fall four spots, to No. 8, on the heels of an uneven performance at Saturday’s Pre-National Invitational. The Washington Huskies are the nation’s top-ranked women’s cross country team, and on paper they look unstoppable, even on the national stage. Head cross country coach Greg Metcalf has the luxury of potentially resting runners at the Pac-10 Championships.
Races, of course, are meant to be run, and outcomes are no sure thing. Life after Galen Rupp has gone as well or better than expected for the men, while the women show flashes of serious talent. Lananna will do his best to put his teams in position to succeed, just as he will do with his newest hire.
Whoever — and whenever — that may be.
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Lananna must make choice soon
Daily Emerald
October 20, 2009
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