Issue date: 4/23/08 Section: Sports

After a history that is unmatched and a stat line that looks reminiscent of something you would see in a sports video game, Arkansas cross country and track and field head coach John McDonnell has finally called it quits.

McDonnell will go down as the most successful cross country/track and field coach in the history of the sports. In fact, it could be argued that McDonnell was the most successful coach from any sport in collegiate history.

McDonnell wasn't a player in the track and field/cross country game, he was the game. Over the past 36 years, McDonnell led the Razorbacks to 42 national titles...the math is correct.

During his tenure, the Razorbacks won 19 national championships in indoor track, 12 in outdoor track and 11 in cross country. In the past 25 years, the Razorbacks have brought home at least one championship 22 times.

Expectations of winning championships every year became so high at Arkansas, that they may as well have been the Yankees… on crack.

The craziest part? McDonnell came through, year after year.

The total gives McDonnell the most national titles out of any Division I collegiate coach in history. In fact, out of the 69 national championships that have been handed out in the three sports, McDonnell's Razorbacks won all but 27.

He's guided the Razorbacks to 34 consecutive conference cross country championships. In the process, he coached 182 All-Americans and 23 Olympians.

From 1984-1995, a span of 12 years, the Razorbacks channeled their inner UCLA (John Wooden and co.) and never lost a national championship bout, the longest such title-streak of any sport in collegiate history.

With all of these accomplishments, it's no wonder McDonnell was the national coach of the year 30 times, conference coach of the year 49 times and regional coach of the year 62 times.

Like the Wizard of Westwood, his greatest accomplishment may have been the ability to take All-American caliber athletes and turn them into team players, rather than individual stars.

"McDonnell applied a team approach to an individual sport and in turn produced the most successful collegiate athletic program in history," Arkansas Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Jeff Long told a representative for SEC sports. "It is hard to imagine that any coach in intercollegiate athletics has had more influence on a program than John McDonnell has had on the men's track and field program at the University of Arkansas."

Continued...

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