Jake Lyskawa
Oct 8, 20227 min
Edits and additional commentary by Garrett Zatlin
The Oregon men have landed their first major commitment of the Jerry Schumacher era.
Just two months after the Bowerman Track Club coach was hired as the Director of Cross Country and Track and Field in Eugene, Oregon, the Ducks scored a commitment from Missouri-based superstar, Connor Burns.
Currently our TSR #3 recruit, Burns ranks behind only the twin Stanford commits, Lex and Leo Young of Newbury Park High School. This time next year, we could end up seeing these historic prep-level standouts toe the line against each other.
Burns has flexed elite range over three years at Southern Boone County High School in Ashland, Missouri. His personal bests of 8:11 in the 3000 meters (en route) and 8:45 in the two mile ranked at the absolute top of the nation amongst all grade levels last spring when excluding 3200 meter conversions.
The future Duck runner also posted the nation’s seventh-fastest high school American mile time ever last outdoor season, dropping a lightning-quick 3:58.83 personal best at the HOKA Festival of Miles.
On paper, Burns' resume and explosive skillset makes him an almost perfect fit for Oregon.
And truthfully, there may be no need to say "almost".
While some of our friendly college suggestions for Burns, such as Missouri and Arkansas in our top-50 recruit rankings, were based on his geographic and familial connections, the Ducks feel like a beautiful synchronous pairing when it came to their current roster composition and what this Southern Boone County senior can offer.
Burns' long distance prowess partially satisfies Oregon's needs for greater aerobic-based scoring on the grass while still balancing the middle distance mentality on the track that was previously established by former men's distance coach, Ben Thomas.
Not only that, but Burns posted top-20 times, nationally, in the 1600 meters (4:06) and the 3200 meters (8:48) last spring. He also collected two top-15 times during the winter months and recorded a sub-15 minute cross country time over 5000 meters last fall.
And keep in mind, this Missouri native accrued all of that success as a junior in high school.
Naturally, one could assume that Burns' best days as a prep runner are still to come.
And after a summer’s worth of training, that suspicion might have some legs to it.
Following a junior cross country season in which he recorded only one sub-15 minute mark over 5000 meters and three sub-16 minute marks, Burns has already dropped his PR to a ridiculous result of 14:32.30 on the grass. That’s a 24-second time drop from his 2021 personal best and it's the fourth-fastest time in the nation this year (at time of publication).
That monster personal best was also the winning time at the Chile Pepper XC Festival on October 1st against an utterly-stacked field.
After two sub-15 minute times and three victories in as many 5k races so far this fall, the now-senior is beginning to make a name for himself on the grass just as much as he did on the oval last spring.
That time drop is notable for Burns whose range and value at multiple events is now as proven as ever. The premiere 5k and three-mile times may still reside at Newbury Park with Lex, Leo and Aaron Sahlman, but Burns is continuing to make a name for himself as an elite three-season athlete.
The sheer talent that Burns possesses is valuable to any school, but the Oregon men are particularly lucky to have picked him up. The Ducks needed the most help of almost any powerhouse team on the cross country course last fall, and that might still be the case at the conclusion of this 2022 season.
The Ducks certainly weren’t horrible by any means throughout 2021, being ranked at No. 29 in the USTFCCCA Coaches Poll and placing 4th at the PAC-12 XC Championships. But with Aaron Bienenfeld's time coming to an end and numerous superstar distance talents already gone, the Oregon men will be heavily relying on young phenoms to help their team reach the next level.
And while a national ranking in the USTFCCCA Coaches Poll would be a cause for celebration for most programs, for Oregon, they are likely aiming for a top-10 position in that hierarchy.
But with Jerry Schumacher coming in as this team's newest coach, one has to anticipate that the Eugene-based men will be rising in those rankings in the near future.
Schumacher is one of the best distance coaches in the world. He has produced 28 Olympians as the leader of Nike's Bowerman Track Club and has experience at the collegiate level as a former national title-winning head coach at Wisconsin.
If the Ducks want to try to break up the impressive run that Colorado and Stanford have had in the PAC-12 over the past 13 years on the grass, then Schumacher is the man to lead them there.
And adding a guy like Burns isn’t a bad start, either.
On the oval, Burns has been a Swiss Army Knife as a high schooler...as most top-three recruits are. However, this sub-four ace not only has plenty of experience and competitive versatility, but he has also consistently improved and earned wins in every event from the 800 meters up to the 5000 meters.
In fact, last spring, Burns logged a personal best time of 1:51 in the 800 meters to take 6th place at Nike Outdoor National Championships which was run at his future home of Hayward Field. Four days before that, at the Brooks PR Invitational, Burns set his national-leading time of 8:45 in the two mile.
Most of the best distance recruits in the country can't come close to refining their speed to that level while still maintaining enough endurance to go sub-8:50 over two miles.
That's extremely rare.
And in theory, Burns' strengths across a variety of distances could mesh perfectly with the incredible versatility that we've seen out of Schumacher's pro athletes.
While many of Schumacher's Nike-sponsored Olympians have focused on races like the 5000 meters, the 10,000 meters and the steeplechase, many of those same athletes have also dropped down to the 1500 meters and the mile, in many cases proving to be fairly effective in those middle distance events.
And when you pair Burns' dynamic resume with the well-rounded nature of Schumacher's training regimen, one has to think that this coach-athlete pairing has the potential to be the best in the nation.
Last year, the Oregon men had a mostly similar, if not slightly better, outdoor track season compared to their cross country efforts. Their 2021 fall campaign was certainly not bad, but it was maybe a bit disappointing considering the prestige that typically comes with this Eugene-based program.
At the 2021 NCAA XC Championships, the Ducks finished 25th overall with Aaron Bienenfeld putting up an outstanding 8th place All-American finish. The Oregon veteran later placed 10th in the 5000 meters at the indoor national meet and then 13th in the 5000 meters as well as 8th in the 10,000 meters at the outdoor national meet.
He was the unquestioned distance leader for the Ducks that weekend on their home track.
However, none of Oregon's 800 meter nor 1500 meter national meet qualifiers from last spring advanced to the finals.
The bad news is that 2022 is Bienenfeld’s last season in Eugene. The good news, however, is that he’s one of only four Oregon men listed as a senior (or older) on the Ducks' 2022 cross country roster.
In other words, the men in green and yellow will still be quite young by the time Burns arrives, and their current core offers some nice potential moving forward.
In fact, three of the Ducks’ 2021 cross country top-seven will be back next year including in Abdnasir Hussein, Quincy Norman and Caleb Brown. Not to mention superstar recruits from the Class of 2022, Rheinhardt Harrison and Larry Josh Edwards, will be a year-more experienced by the time Burns steps foot on campus.
The combination of Harrison, Edwards and Burns will be particularly interesting to watch in the coming years. That’s an overwhelmingly talented freshman-sophomore trio, theoretically better than any other American grouping in the NCAA, when they join forces in 2023.
Bringing in Burns next year not only provides a young team with a versatile scoring threat throughout each and every season, but he could also act as a recruiting domino in the Schumacher era.
With Shalane Flanagan on board as an assistant coach, Schumacher and company have already proven that their combined reputation, compounded with the Nike-sponsored, historic program that is Oregon, has the potential to bring in a plethora of high-level recruits in the near future.
In fact, on the women's side, Kate Peters actually de-committed from Oklahoma State to join the Ducks earlier this fall, citing Flanagan's hiring as a reason to stay in-state.
And if a historically elite sub-four high school miler in Connor Burns is the first recruiting domino to fall for Oregon, then who else could commit to this program in the coming days, weeks and months?
Aaron Sahlman may not in contention to join the Ducks following his post on Instagram from late September, but what about Devan Kipyego, a guy who might be just as versatile as Burns? He'll be making his commitment on November 9th.
Simeon Birnbaum, much like Burns, is another sub-four high school miler from a similarly competitive state (South Dakota). Could he see Burns' commitment and opt to join him?
The possibilities are endless.
A slight retooling of the Oregon men’s distance program, specifically when it comes to cross country, has felt a bit overdue these past few years.
Sure, the Ducks have had plenty of jaw-dropping individual success thanks to men like Bienenfeld, Cole Hocker, Cooper Teare, Reed Brown and more. But with those guys mostly gone and their accolades largely centered on the track rather than the grass, Burns will look to potentially become the new face of Oregon distance running, leading a deep, versatile crop of runners into a new era in Eugene.
If the influence of Burns' commitment to Oregon is as heavy as we think it is, then this recruiting class could become scary-good in the months.
And the same could be said about this program as a whole in the coming years.