Finley named head cross country coach
Steve Finley, a high school state champion in cross country and two-time Division I All-American in track, hired as head cross country coach.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013 10:37 AM
Bicoastal steeplechase All-American Steve Finley was hired as Muhlenberg’s head coach of cross country. He also will be an assistant with the track and field program.
Finley is a 2010 graduate of the University of Virginia, where he was a two-time Atlantic Coast Conference runner-up in the steeplechase. As a senior, he finished 11th in the event at the NCAA Championships to earn All-America honors.
While at Virginia, Finley also ran on the first-place 4x800 relay team at the Penn Relays Championship of America and the cross country team that won the 2008 ACC championship.
After graduating from Virginia, Finley transferred to the University of Oregon to take graduate classes with one year of athletic eligibility remaining. As a Duck in 2011, he won the steeplechase at the Pac-10 Championships and posted the top collegiate time of the year (8:36.93). At the NCAA Championships, he finished 13th to earn All-America honors for the second straight year.
Finley qualified for the USA Track & Field Championships in the steeple three consecutive years from 2009 to 2011, advancing to the final and placing 13th in 2011.
Finley competed as an athlete for Oregon Track Club Elite following his college career, training with an international group of professional athletes. He also served as a volunteer operations assistant for the Club, working with national-, world- and Olympic-class athletes and coaches on a daily basis.
For the past two years, Finley was a volunteer recruiting assistant at Track Town USA In Eugene, Ore., developing and implementing a recruiting plan for the Oregon Track Club under the guidance of 12-time NCAA Division I national championship coach Vin Lananna.
Finley attended Palatine (Ill.) High School, where he was the 2005 state champion in cross country and placed 33rd at the Foot Locker national championships in San Diego.
Finley, whose father Doug Finley is an assistant cross country and track coach at Muhlenberg, inherits a cross country program that has sent at least one runner to the NCAA Division III Championships in each of the last eight years.
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