Harter adds to legacy

Editor's Note: This is the final of a four-part series highlighting the best coaches and athletes at the University of Arkansas in 2014.

FAYETTEVILLE - For more than 30 years, Lance Harter has specialized in distance running.

So it should come as no surprise that the Razorbacks women's track & field and cross country coach knows how to pace himself. Harter continues to produce the same kind of results as he did upon arriving at Arkansas a quarter-century ago.

Since then, Harter has coached his teams to 23 conference championships and four national runner-up finishes. Prior to that he won 14 Division-II national championships at Cal Poly.

Few years have been so good for Harter as 2014, though. The Razorbacks have re-emerged as one of the elite teams in the SEC, winning conference championships outdoors and in cross country, and finishing in the top nine at the NCAA meet in all three sports.

Arkansas finished third in the 2014 Terry Crawford Award standings, which calculate the nation's top overall programs in all three sports.

To cap it off, Harter was inducted into the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame in Phoenix earlier this month - a fitting end to a year that he calls one of the three best of his career.

"In my mind, 2014 is going to be one of those banner years for us," Harter said. "The only thing we didn't get done is the triple crown."

After finishing third at the conference indoor championships, Arkansas bounced back with a great outdoor season. A 1-2-3 finish in the 5,000 meters helped the Razorbacks upset Florida and win their first SEC championship outdoors in a decade.

"People pay attention to the 1-2-3 finish, but just before that we went 1-2-3-6 in the pole vault," Harter said. "Those are points people don't pay attention to because it's not on the oval. It was the epitome of the total team effort."

Arkansas won its second SEC championship of the calendar year at the league cross country meet in October. The Razorbacks finished 1-2 in the race, and Dominique Scott won SEC runner of the year honors for the second year in a row.

"It was one of those rare instances where as a coach I could be relaxed because we were so loaded with talent, maturity and leadership that we were going to be hard to be denied," Harter said. "I think we as a staff were privileged to have a bunch of athletes who really evolved over the time they were here and lead us in track and cross country."

Dating to the cross country season the year before, the most recent win was the third in the last four SEC meets for the Razorbacks.

That Arkansas is still competitive in all three sports is a rarity in modern college track and cross country. With a limited number of scholarships, many schools have stopped investing in all three sports.

"Just lately, in the last three to five years, it's become an age of specialization," Harter said. "You have LSU, Texas A&M, Southern California and Central Florida, just to name a few, that have said, 'Let's just forget cross country. We're going to take our scholarship allocation and we're going to have to go after sprints and jumps and hurdles.'

"Then there are others, who seem to be greater in numbers - Villanova, Oklahoma State, Iowa State, Providence, etc., that are focusing on cross country. When I left the national (cross country) meet this year, one of the prominent coaches in the United States said, 'Now we've got to go hide for nine months,' because they were going to focus on next year's cross country. We're basically becoming an anomaly trying to have a top program in all three."

Arkansas men's coach Chris Bucknam understands Harter's dilemma because he has the same one. Bucknam said the shift from schools competing in all three sports makes Harter's most recent year all the more impressive.

"It's not only a special thing, it's the hardest thing to do," Bucknam said. "Lance was fifth for a national championship and there's no question that if he went that route, he could win a national championship in cross country. But because of the investment in facilities that our school has made and the past history, we still adhere to (the way things used to be done).

"We have to swallow a big pill knowing that at Arkansas you have to be relevant in all three sports. You just can't be relevant in cross country and you just can't be relevant in outdoor track. Not many other schools have that DNA. I think the great ones do and Arkansas is one of the great ones. We go by the beat of a different drum because of our history."

Harter is quick to deflect credit to his assistant coaches, who he praised extensively during his induction speech in Phoenix.

"He has a great staff and he allows his staff to coach," Bucknam said. "There's no micromanaging."

With many of his older runners eligible through the end of the spring, 2015 could bring similar success for Harter and the Razorbacks. Arkansas appears to be particularly strong indoors, where it will host the NCAA championships in March with hopes of bringing the longtime coach his first team national championship at the highest level.

"I think this indoor team could be really, really special," Harter said.