Mick Byrne previews the NCAA Championship
November 17, 2009 | Men's Cross Country
Nov. 17, 2009
MADISON, Wis.--Mick Byrne and the No. 10 Wisconsin men's cross country team won the NCAA Great Lakes Regional Championship 10-kilometer race last weekend. Winning the title earned them a spot at the NCAA Championships in Terre Haute, Ind on Monday, Nov. 23. Head coach Mick Byrne visited with media Monday to talk about the upcoming NCAA Championship. Below is the transcript.
Byrne press conference (video)
Mick Byrne: "We're excited about next Monday's race. Obviously, a national championship, and any time you go to nationals and you're competing for hopefully a podium spot, that's exciting. Our lineup this year is a lot different, obviously, than last year. Last year, we had three fifth-year seniors. And when you're going to a national championship with that type of experience, it certainly helps. This year, our team is a completely different team. We're going to the meet next week with three freshmen and, obviously, we do have some older kids in the lineup also, but any time you go with three young kids who haven't been to the meet before, well, anything can happen. So we're excited about this opportunity. We're coming off two great meets. Big Ten Championships was very exciting for us, and this past weekend's regional meet was also very exciting. We had a tough time in the middle of the race on Saturday, and the kids pulled it together and held it together really well over the last 2k and finished with a win. Any time you win, whether it's a Big Ten Championship or regional championship, the momentum from those wins going forward to a national championship is obviously a good thing."
QUESTION #1: How do you think freshman Mohammed Ahmed and Maverick Darling handled the big stage like you saw at the regionals this past weekend?
BYRNE: They both did a great job. Right around 6k, Maverick ran into some trouble. He got some cramps. And you don't very often see a young freshman being able to handle a situation like that. He didn't panic. He listened to what we were telling him from the sidelines, backed off a little bit. In fact, he went all the way back to about 30th place, and over the last 2k got going again. And I think when you go forward to a meet like the national championships, and you're able to take that experience, the lessons that from this past weekend, that's going to stand to help him next Monday.
QUESTION #2: Mick, what is your comfort level with this team, a year removed from your first go-around with them?
BYRNE: It's a completely different team, a different heartbeat. The older guys last year, obviously, brought a ton of experience down to national championships. Stuart Eagon, Matt Withrow, Christian Wagner were all on the team from previous NCAA national championship teams, and that type of experience is unbelievable as you go into the national meet. When you look down that line, and you see 32, 31 teams, you know, a lot of what happens at the national meet is up here. It's how you handle the pressure of that and how you handle, you know, the long season. With these young guys, they're fearless, which is exciting. They respect the 10k distance. For a lot of them, they're going twice what they were running this time last year, and that's huge. But they know they're coming off two great meets, the Big Ten and the regional meet. They know that we've had some issues with the meet and with the way they ran. They're going to correct some things this week and hopefully they'll be okay.
QUESTION #3: You said anything can happen in a meet like this, with a young team like you have. What's the best that might happen?
BYRNE: Well, the best that can happen is some of the other teams falter. Last year, Oklahoma State was probably one of the favorites, and it didn't happen for them. You have to have five guys running together, they have to gel together next week. We're hoping that some other teams make mistakes, and hopefully we can capitalize on those mistakes. Again, going into the meet, hopefully these kids are not going to put the occasion too far ahead of the actual race. The NCAA championships sometimes can become overwhelming for some kids. I don't think it's going to happen to our guys. They've all competed at a high level in the high school and I think that they're looking forward to the challenge. They're looking forward to some other teams making mistakes.
QUESTION #4: With having a couple of youngsters up top, and having Landon Peacock and Craig Miller , if he's healthy, Jack Bolas, and Ryan Gasper, that's a pretty good place as far as leadership is concerned. And guys who've been through this before can help those young guys, right?
BYRNE: Yeah. With those three or four guys, we had a big issue when Craig Miller ran into some trouble this weekend. He had a reflux issue and he didn't certainly perform up to what he's capable. He was our fifth scorer, ran real well, ran a very intelligent race in the Big Tens. For us to do well next Monday, we're going to have to find a solution to this reflux issue real quickly here. I'm going to be talking with the doctors and trainers today, because we're going to certainly need him. It's just the experience. He's runner-up indoors in the mile. Milers can run real well on that course in Terre Haute, and hopefully we're going to get that corrected. Landon Peacock is coming back into form. He struggled early on. He had an injury issue back in August, took away some of his confidence, and he feels real good about his run last Saturday at regionals. He felt better and thought he could have went into another gear, so that's exciting. And Ryan Gasper, obviously, has had some difficulty this May. Ryan is certainly running with a lot more confidence this year, so hopefully he can step up to the plate.
QUESTION #5: My question is about Ryan Gasper, can you talk about how he's progressed from last year to his role on the team this year?
BYRNE: I think for Ryan it's just a confidence issue. I think that his performances outdoors this year in the steeplechase gave him an awful lot of confidence, and he's taken that confidence into, obviously, cross country. He hasn't had the best look at the national meet. He's certainly performed the last two meets. The Big Ten was his highest place finish, and certainly at regionals last weekend he looked very good. He was in control most of the race and was basically just what we would call, I guess in the soccer business, a sweeper. He just kept an eye on what was going on and did a real good job with that when we needed him to pull up some places, and the latter part of the race he was able to do that. So with Ryan, it's a confidence thing. I think we have him in a spot right now where he's all time high in terms of confidence. Basically, for him, it's just getting to that 10k mark. It's such a huge gap from his 3k specialty in the steeplechase.
QUESTION #6: Mick, when you were talking about your team needs other teams to make mistakes to perhaps grasp the moment, is your team incapable of seizing the moment on its own or do you need another team, a couple teams to fall, to falter? I just want to make sure I interpret that correctly.
BYRNE: I think that any time you go out there to compete for a national title or compete in a national championships getting help from other teams is good. It's not a bad thing. So hopefully, we're going to be firing on all cylinders next Monday, and some other teams won't. Again, we're talking about kids. We're talking about national championships and a long season and anything can go on out there. We don't know what the weather is going to be like in a week's time out in Terre Haute. Hopefully we'll get weather that's more favorable to us. And our kids like it, obviously, a little bit colder. It was 65, 66 degrees in Indiana last weekend, and pretty warm for this time of year, obviously. And our guys like it when it's a bit colder. It might take away from some other kids from some of the top teams. But no, I think that our kids are real confident. They are young, but they're very confident. They feel that they have a shot at getting on the podium. And I think, to be realistic, that's a great goal for us. That would be a tremendous achievement with the fact that we're going into the race with three freshmen. And for me, it's about what type of experience they're going to have. Hopefully it's going to be a great experience. It's a learning curve, and we're excited about the future with these young kids.
