On Thursday, November 17, Dr. Bruce Geelhoed of Ball Statue University and Dr. Mark Havitz of the University of Waterloo gave a lecture about the storied rivalry between the IU and MSU cross country teams of the 1940s and 1950s. The primary focus of the lecture was on MSU's legendary cross country coach, Karl Schlademan.
If Coach Schlademan's name isn't familiar to you, you're not alone. In fact, I had never even heard of the IU, MSU rivalry before the lecture, much less the coach of MSU's cross country team of the time.
Honestly, the lecture gave me a new respect for cross country as sport (one which I have been involved with in the past) and the genius behind Schlademan's coaching style.
While it may seem like a cold reality, college cross country coaching is all about grooming your start runners, and no one did this better than MSU in the 40s and 50s. Coach Schlademan had a demeanor that not only demanded respect, it gave it back as well. The result was the ability to recruit nearly any great runner in the nation, and it led to over a decade of dominance from the MSU cross country team.
While much of the early rivalry between IU and MSU went very much in IU's favor, Schlademan turned the fortunes of MSU around. Cross country was the first major sport that MSU achieved national dominance participating in, and Schlademan's coaching likely propelled the university into other sporting ventures. Schlademan's importance to the school can not be over-stated.
The lecture was the result of a summer worth of collaboration between Dr. Geelhoed and Dr. Havitz. It was informative in a very interesting topic that is often overshadowed by other, more popular sports, but it proved to be one of the best lectures of the semester.
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