The Iowa Central Community College men’s cross country team is one click of a mouse from having a shot at a national championship.
The Tritons were ruled ineligible to compete in the Nov. 12 national meet in Hobbs, N.M., because of what eighth-year coach Dee Brown called “an extremely frustrating clerical error.”
Here’s what happened:
Brown, like all community college coaches, had to submit eligibility for every student-athlete on the team to the National Junior College Athletic Association before the Region XI meet a year ago. The information includes personal information, grade, credits attempted, GPA and so on.
Brown thought all of the athletes were eligible. He realized on the Monday before the national meet last fall that information for one athlete, who joined the team late, hadn’t been submitted.
“We had his all filled out,” Brown said Monday of the online form. “It didn’t get submitted. We didn’t push OK.
“This one guy just wanted to run, wanted to compete. He was the 30th man on the team. The only race he ran was a regional meet.”
It didn’t matter. The Tritons had competed with an ineligible runner.
Brown, who won national cross country titles on the women’s side in 2007 and 2008 and has finished second twice nationally with the men, immediately reported the error to the NJCAA. The NJCAA allowed Iowa Central to compete in the national meet, where the Tritons finished sixth.
The one caveat was that the Triton men would be banned from competing in the national meet this fall.
Brown had to watch last weekend as North Iowa Area Community College easily crushed the Region XI competition in Creston.
“It would have been a fun race,” Brown said of the lost matchup between the schools. “I think NIACC is a top-five team (nationally). I know we could have gone 1-2 on them. I would have thought our 3 through 7 guys would have been able to stay with them”
Brown believes he might have his best men’s team during his eight years in Fort Dodge. He has a very strong 1-2 combination in freshmen Stanley Kebenei and Jamal Boma. Abbabiya Simbassa and Kemal Jarso have added quality depth.
The Tritons finished fifth in the Division II race at the prestigious Roy Griak Invitational in Minneapolis, defeating a host of schools. They finished in the middle of the pack at Oklahoma State’s Cowboy Jamboree at the beginning of this month, defeating NCAA Division I teams TCU, North Texas and Oral Roberts. They won the Central Invitational in Pella over several NCAA Division III schools.
“I’m confident we could have been in the top three, if not better,” Brown said of nationals.
Brown admitted he could have ignored the mistake and the ruling NJCAA organization probably would have never known. But he is the current secretary for the NJCAA Track and Field Coaches Association and wanted to do the honest thing.
And he says his team now has to pay for the mistake.
“It was such a little fluke,” Brown said. “It bothers me because of a clerical, administrative error that these kids are getting penalized. Over half of the kids weren’t even here last year. They had nothing to do with that. It’s annoying. Fine the school or something. It wasn’t malicious.”
Brown will instead go to New Mexico in a week and a half with hopes of winning only a women’s national title. His women’s team dominated the region meet and is ranked third nationally.
“I’m very excited to see how they’ll do at nationals,” Brown said. “I don’t want to talk it up much yet, but I can’t see any reason why we can’t be No. 1.”
There is one positive for the Triton men. They will have a chance to win a national title at the five-person NJCAA Half Marathon Championships in Marietta, Ga., on Nov. 19.
“The men have to win the half marathon,” Brown said. “They’re really determined and focused to win it. They want to win national championship rings.
“That will only ease the sting.”
LATER THIS WEEK: The making of a championship program, how Brown has helped build a cross country and track and field power in Fort Dodge in eight short years.
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