Why doesn't USF have a great Track Program?

I have been wondering why USF has not been dominating the Big East Track and Field Championships like I thought a Florida School would be. For crying out loud USF is in FLORIDA one( or probably the best) of the best Track and Field States. Just look at the other schools in the State and see how they taken advantage of the athletes in the state. First look at FSU they have always had a great track program and just came in second place in the NCAA championships,but they do recruit heavily from other countries. Now look at UF,that has been recruiting heavily in Florida for the past couple years. They won the Indoor national championship this year and won the Outdoor national championship last year. UF also loves having big High school meets on their campus to get the better recruits to "tour" their campus.

So what wrong with USF Track and Field? Well the big problem is that some of their best athletes are on the football team. Don't get me wrong I understand why they need to be on the team for their unique talents. But I wish they would recruit just Track specific athletes that won't skip a Track season to prepare for football (Terrence Mitchell, Lindsey Lamar).  We should also be dominating the sprinting events because USF is located in Florida ( nations top sprinting factory). Thus also giving us some points in some field events like long jump and triple jump, because most sprinters do both. I can understand why we do poor in the long distance events, because the long distance power house states are either up north or out west. But we should at least be competitive in those events.

In this years Big East Championship we came in fourth and that is respectable. But I think USF can do a lot better than that, especially since its located in a great location and not just Florida but Tampa as well. For crying out loud we lost the 4x100 relay to UConn. I feel we should be winning that title year in and year out.

How to fix it

The biggest thing USF can do is just host Big Track meets for the states best athletes. This is probably the most effective way to get recruits on campus. By big meets, I mean try to get to host the Florida runners prime time meet like they did in Charlotte high school. This is when they invite the best high school athletes in the state of  Florida to go to head to head. Also by trying to host smaller track meets that are Tampa specific can  also help both Football and Track recruiting and help Holtz "Build a Fence around Tampa. Its just simple logic the more the run at USF the more comfortable they get, thus staying here. Also recruiting in Jamaica and the other Island nations can't hurt since we already have a large Caribbean population on campus.

I know I've been really negative about the Track program, but I do not want to seem that way. I just feel that we can do a lot better in the location that we are in. Also I kinda feel bad that we are falling behind other Florida track programs and I just want to see some changes for my alma mater.