Track deserves more university attention

East Carolina’s track and field team had 31 athletes on the men’s team and 49 athletes on the women’s team and sent 13 athletes to the NCAA preliminary rounds in Lexington, Kentucky last week.

This season was successful in seeing multiple school and personal records broken, while also winning some league titles at the American Athletic Conference Outdoor Championships. One example of the team’s success is Stefano Migliorati. The sophomore from Calvisaro, Italy broke the school’s men’s 800 meter race record twice this year and also won the AAC title in the same event. The Pirates achieved this in the outdoor season while having only one home meet and five away meets before the conference championships. 

The problem with this setup though, is the unfair quality of meets that the team gets to travel to and compete in. The track and field team has to travel to other North Carolina universities such as Duke, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State. However, these meets don’t always offer the best competition for the team to improve and be on bigger stages to help get the publicity they so deserve.

ECU could put more money towards sending the track and field team to bigger track meets, such as the Drake Relays. Along with this, the track and field team could use more money to bring better competition to their one home meet the Bill Carson Invitational they have each outdoor season. Having watched this past years’ home meets in person, I witnessed the level of competition first hand, and while some participating schools were competitive, others were not.

If the athletic program would put more of a focus on the “small money” sports, such as track and field, swimming and softball, I believe the university would grow and could possibly lead to getting into bigger conferences, such as the ACC, which holds in-state rivals, UNC and NC State. 

Not only does the track and field team not get enough attention from the athletic program, it is missing its support from the students in the university as well. I put that blame on a lack of unity from the “small money” sports and the student body. However, if these sports were to get more money and be put in better situations to improve their standings in the conference, there would be more of a well-rounded sense of connection to all the sports that ECU has.

Overall, the track and field program has a bright future ahead of itself and could one day be one of the “big money” sports. If the program were to get the necessary improvements in funding and opportunity to compete in larger meets with bigger track programs, it could allow this university to improve and bring in more money and create greater and better opportunities.