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RCC ends track, cross-country programs Sunday Apr 29, 2018 at 2:01 AM By Kaylee TornayMail Tribune Rogue Community College is down to two sports teams for the foreseeable future. The school’s Athletic Department is discontinuing both the cross-country and long-distance track programs, the latter of which had run for only one season. The first Osprey cross-country runners ran in the 2015 season, when the community college entered the Northwest Athletic Conference. The cross-country program in particular encountered issues when coach Cole Watson left six weeks before the season began for other professional running pursuits, Athletic Director Darren Van Lehn said. “It’s not something we wouldn’t want Cole to do,” Van Lehn said. “But we were unable to find someone to coach and so the team kind of fell apart.” The school decided to take a year’s hiatus from the cross-country season, but planned at first to return the following year, Van Lehn said. But with Watson’s exit, several of RCC’s competitive runners also left to run at other schools. As a result, the long-distance track team was similarly impacted. Van Lehn said the programs were discontinued when “we just became aware that while we’re a new and small program with limited resources, the way to create the best opportunity was to go in a different direction at this point than to continue cross-country.” He called the decision to do so “bittersweet,” although he also mentioned that both programs could be resurrected if sufficient resources and participation justify expenses. One of the ways Van Lehn, who has filled the newly created athletic director position since August 2017 after previously working as an academic adviser, hopes to broaden the athletic department’s offerings is by creating a booster club. He said he encounters community members who frequently are not aware that the school offers conference-level competitive athletic opportunities. “We need to establish our visibility to the communities and to the public,” he said. “Once we’re more visible and established and have consistent student athletes every year, I hope the college will take a look at the information we put together and hopefully decide that more sports is a positive direction for everybody.” RCC’s men’s and women’s soccer teams will continue. Reach Mail Tribune reporter Kaylee Tornay at [email protected] or 541-776-4497. Follow her on Twitter @ka_tornay.