Davidson begins first year as track and field head coach
The men's track and field team opened its 1996 indoor season last weekend at the Cougar Indoor Opener and the Sooner Invitational.
Since Rice athletes were competing at both events simultaneously, team results were not especially strong.
The former took place at the University of Houston's sparkling, new Athletics/Alumni Center, which was completely full for its inaugural event.
Among the crowd were a fair number of Rice students who turned out to cheer for the Owls.
At the end of the day, however, the men's squad could post only 39 points and finished last among the six teams. The University of Texas took the title with 119 points.
Rice's top performer was sophomore Andrew Burrow. The defending Southwest Conference indoor 600-yard champion captured second-place in the 800-meter dash.
His time of 1:54.42 was encouraging, as it is close to his best indoor time in that event last year, although still far from the NCAA standard qualifying mark.
"It was a rough race," Burrow said. "The eventual winner just broke out a little too far for me to catch."
Junior Quinton Milner's time of 49.57 in the 400-meters was better than his top time in the event last year. The effort earned him a third-place finish.
High jumper Chad Kopp, who came on strong toward the end of last year's outdoor season, got off on the right foot by taking third place with a 6-10.75 jump.
And sophomore Kodili Odimgbe, the hero of the 1995 conference indoor championship, put the shot 53-10.25, good enough for another third-place spot. The coaches were especially pleased with Odimgbe's effort as he has been working on a brand-new technique for the event.
The distance runners were not as successful. Although six competed in individual races, Adam Reiser's sixth place in the 5,000-meters was the top finish.
Freshman Derrick Small and Jaime Price posted 600-yard times of 1:13.17 and 1:13.79, respectively, and Drexell Owusu jumped 23 in the long jump.
The Owls embark on this indoor season as the defending Southwest Conference champions. They won that title last year in dramatic fashion when Odimgbe's final throw placed him first in the shot put by one inch, giving Rice the title by one point over Baylor.
Last year's campaign was marked by great success. The SWC Championships featured five individual champions. Three of them went on to score 22 points for Rice at the NCAA Indoor Championships, earning the Owls a tie for seventh place nationally.
But the 1995 effort was also hampered by controversy and discontinuity.
There were allegations of NCAA rule violations concerning supposed dealings of two athletes with an agent. As a result, team chemistry, especially between the coaching staff and a few athletes, never completely gelled. Several athletes ended up leaving the team before the end of the outdoor season.
Completing the tumult that had lain just beneath the surface was the resignation and retirement this past fall of Head Coach Steve Straub. Straub has been the head coach for the last 15 years.
New Head Coach Ray Davidson, an assistant coach last year, takes the helm of a young team that is talented but depleted of most of its biggest names.
Gone is world-class long jumper and sprinter Kareem Streete-Thompson, as well as triple jumper Ivory Angello, another top performer who rewrote the Rice records in his event.
Hurdlers Bryan Bronson and Cliff Alexander will also be missed; they scored for Rice at the NCAA Indoor and Outdoor Championships, respectively.
One of the athletes who departed early was Chris Jones; he surely would have been a headliner this year as one of the top collegiate quarter-milers and a competitor in the Pan-American Games.
Davidson does return several formidable competitors. Burrow and Milner will be counted on to lead the Owls' effort, as will junior Brian Klein. Klein has been tripped up -- literally -- in his last several SWC attempts at the 800-meter crown, but he looks to repeat the type of performances that made him the SWC outdoor champion as a freshman in 1994.
Distance runners Reiser, Luis Armenteros, Jeff Lewis and Dan Brooks also return.
They will be aided by a strong recruiting class that includes Small, the holder of the Texas state high-school record in the 800-meters and a 1995 USA Today All-USA Track and Field selection.
Price, also from Texas, owned the fourth-best 800 time in the state in 1995.
Owusu, a dual-purpose threat in both the long and triple jumps and the son of a former Olympian, will gaze into the huge footprints of Angello and Streete-Thompson.
He'll be aided not only by renowned jumps coach Wen Yong Yang, but also by the experience and advice of the stars themselves. There are at least 10 Olympic hopefuls training at Rice.
Ross Andres and Brendon Zeidler round out Rice's newcomers. They each posted high jumps at or near seven feet in high school.
By all counts, 1996 figures to be a rebuilding year.
"This season will certainly be different from last year," Davidson said. "We graduated a tremendous amount of talent, and although we have great recruits, they're only freshmen. It will take some time for them to mature and their talent to develop."
Davidson has taken a slow approach, working less toward getting all the athletes into top running form immediately and more toward pacing them to peak later in the year.
"As far as the team goes, there are really no high expectations this year," Klein said. "It's probably better that way because it takes the pressure off the freshmen and allows them to develop."
Burrow concurs. "We have a lot of excellent athletes, but we lack the depth that we had last year. It is definitely a rebuilding time now, but we'll be very good in the next few years," he said.
Nevertheless, Davidson thinks that several Owls could potentially qualify for the NCAA's, including Klein, Burrow, Milner, Kopp, Odimgbe and possibly one or more freshmen. Rice has a slew of excellent half-milers, and nationals in the 4x400 should not be out of reach.
Defense of the SWC indoor title will probably be a stretch at best, although Davidson thinks that it's too early to predict the conference. "Texas has the numbers," he said. "But Houston is talented and could challenge, and Baylor is always in the picture."
For Davidson, the immediate results of this season will not be an accurate measure of the team's overall success.
"My philosophy has always been that I'm concerned not only with building one of the best track teams but also with how these kids develop as people over their four years and where they are five or 10 years from now."
This item appeared in the Sports section of the January 26, 1996 issue.
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