T&FN Interview — Chris Bucknam

IT GOES ALMOST WITHOUT SAYING in sports that succeeding a legendary coach is one of the hardest things to do. That’s especially true if said legend compiled a record of success in one era that’s all but impossible to match in the current one, or has won the hearts of fans and alums in a way that make it exceedingly difficult to measure up.

So it was on June 27, 2008, when Chris Bucknam stepped into the shoes of the men’s head track & field/cross country coach at Arkansas, following the legendary John McDonnell. Over 17-plus years since then, “Buck” excelled on a level that would be envied by 99% of the mentors in the sport: 2 national titles (NCAA Indoor in ’13 and ’23), 6 runner-up and 12 other podium finishes and 34 SEC crowns — including 6 coveted conference “triple crowns” — winning all three titles in one year.

Ironically, maybe the truest indication of Buck’s success has been earning a USTFCCCA award named for his predecessor. The John McDonnell Award, which celebrates excellence across the board — cross-country, indoor and outdoor track — has been claimed by Bucknam and Arkansas the past 2 years and 4 of the past 9.

Not bad for a phys ed major from Norwich University in Vermont. The Beverly, Massachusetts, native then matriculated after his undergrad years to Northern Iowa, where he got his MA in the same discipline and launched a 25-year career as head coach of the Panthers — where he produced another lifetime’s worth of gaudy championship numbers — prior to Arkansas.

In an hour-long chat, we asked Bucknam not only about what it was like to take over for McDonnell 17 years ago — and what prompted him now, at 69, to step aside and hand the baton to longtime assistant Doug Case — but also to reflect on some of his favorite memories in Fayetteville. He also gave us his take on the newest surge of international athletes populating NCAA rosters and the challenges the sport is facing with the NIL, the transfer portal, revenue sharing and roster limits.

We started out by asking about what his AD at Arkansas, Hunter Yurachek, said at Buck’s recent press conference about a “deal” they made and how his retirement decision went down.

Bucknam: I did talk to Hunter a few times since I was at the end of my present contract and I had a 2-year extension sitting on my desk and… I kind of let it lapse for a while. So he goes, “Hey man, you gonna sign this thing or not?” And I said, “Yeah, I’m gonna sign it.” That was maybe back in the spring.

But it was at that point I told him, “Hey, I’m just seriously thinking about this, and I haven’t made a final decision yet, but talking to [wife] Cindy and everything I’m thinking that could be my final year.” And he goes, “Hey, whatever it takes,” you know, “Sign this and you will do a continuing 1-year contract after 2 years; you can coach here as long as you want.”

So we had a phenomenal year across the board, you know; it was an emotional [NCAA Indoor], an emotional Outdoor meet. In June we were in it for the national title and as you know, we lost that meet by a point. It’s really hard to kind of sit back and think [about retiring] when you’re all jacked up from indoor and outdoor track and now the portal’s opened up. It was just one of those things, like I just wasn’t ready to even think about it.

And then over the summer, after talking with Cindy, it came clear to me that, hey, you know what? It’s time to step down… time to hopefully pass this on to Coach Case. It really had nothing to do with my energy level, or anything like that at all. I mean, I could coach another 5 years. I’m feeling great. I don’t feel 69, I feel 49.

But yet I just felt like I owed it to my family; that this is the time to do it. My mom and dad live in Massachusetts and my dad’s 95 years old. I haven’t seen him since the 4th of July because of cross country, the World Championships, and all that stuff, and so it’s kind of like, “Hey, you know what? I think I’m done.”

You know, my daughter Kate is the head cross country coach at Kansas State. My son and grandson live in Houston. My poor wife who’s been with me — well, I’ve been a head coach since I’ve been 28, so just about all of our married life she’s had to deal with three seasons of coaching for all those years. So, it just kind of came to a time. If all my peeps were right here in Fayetteville, I could keep going, but they’re not. So that’s kind of how it came to fruition.

And then No. 2 is, hey, no better time than the present, right? This gives Coach Case an opportunity to take control at the start of the season. I am officially done December 31, but once cross country is done, it’s about transition and his ramping up the indoor season.

So, really, it comes at a perfect time, because now he can go into the indoors as the head coach, hire an assistant to take my place, and they can be off and running. We host the NCAA [Indoor] Championships in Fayetteville and we have a great team. We’re gonna contend for titles in both those trophy meets, SECs and NCAAs. It’s just an awesome time for him to take over and solidify where he’s at. And then when the portal hits, when the recruiting hits, that second phase in June, it’s like everything’s settled, so it seemed like the perfect time.

T&FN: Obviously NIL and the transfer portal have dramatically changed NCAA sports in recent years. It’s created a lot of new challenges, to say the least, especially for coaches like yourself who’ve been in the game for decades. What’s your take and experience navigating these waters? Would you say having to deal with that has perhaps hastened your retirement decision a little, or not?

Bucknam: Good questions. First of all, things changed quite a bit with NIL, and the transfer portal kicking in and the freedom of movement of athletes. We’ve actually been thriving in that, as far as that’s concerned. Not to say that we don’t get 5-star kids, right out of high school, but we don’t get them all, that’s for sure.

My whole career here, there’s some great high school coaches here in Arkansas that produce some great talent, and we benefit from that; the women have benefited from that, even from some surrounding states. But it’s not really a hotbed for track & field.

So we’ve been kind of in the transfer portal mode for years and years; a lot of our kids are out-of-state kids. So when that hit, we were thriving in it. We’ve gotten a lot of athletes that have transferred in and done a phenomenal job.

I love the challenge and even the challenge with the NIL, it’s just finding another way to win and embracing it, always looking at it as a glass half-full. That’s how we always did it. And we’re killing it on the transfer portal. We just get so many great guys.

We have phenomenal facilities here. We host a lot of meets, a lot of people get their eyes on Fayetteville once they’re in college. And it’s just kind of one of those things where if a kid wants to go to grad school or something like that we’re an option.

That has never been a problem, and I know some other coaches are like that. And so that was the thing. It exponentially changed on July 1 when revenue-share kicked in and roster limits became a hard number, 17 and 45, I think. But then the SEC came in with 35 total on the roster in track, 10 in cross country.

I was interviewed with you guys last spring when this was all gonna kick in and it was one of those things where to me, it wasn’t so much the roster number. Yeah, it’s an issue for us a little bit, but it was how many scholarships the school was going to award you. And that’s where I think things have gone since July 1 in track & field; it’s scattered all over the place now.

As a men’s coach, we pretty much knew we had 12.6 scholarships; that was workable for everybody. Now you can have up to 45 with some conferences, 35 in the SEC, and everybody’s got a different amount now. So parity, everything, was turned upside down. So, you know, huge challenge.

But again, that didn’t push me out, OK? What pushed me out was, “Hey, time for a younger coach to come in here, give him his opportunity, and to see my own family,” the whole bit. So didn’t mean to give you a long, drawn-out answer, but it comes in two parts: the transfer portal and NIL, that was a few years ago. We’ve done well in that. Now, this is a different time, but Coach Case can deal with it now.

T&FN: At your retirement press conference you talked about “high ceilings.” What does that phrase mean to you?

Bucknam: Ultimately, when you look and talk to the champions, and you talk about the competition in the NCAA, there’s nothing like it. I mean, it’s so unique. And usually champions in life have a high ceiling, OK?

Part of the reason I came to Arkansas from Northern Iowa was because my ceiling as a coach was above what I had there. That’s pushing the limits and pushing performance for me as a head coach. You look at someone like Frank O’Mara, all the great things that he accomplished post-collegiately. He was still getting his MBA and he was getting a law degree, all while that was going on and probably helping Coach McDonnell coach.

So at the end of the day, Frank’s ceiling was up high. Cole Hocker’s ceiling is up way up above everybody else’s. To me, the people that complain about it don’t have a high ceiling. Another example: I see a cardiologist, Dr. Bogomilov, and he’s Russian. I see him once a year and he checks my heart and all that stuff. I’m glad he’s here in Fayetteville, OK? I’m glad that talent is here.

It enriches everybody, because these kids that don’t go pro or whatever, they end up. You know, we have so many alums, so many of Coach Mac’s alums that he brought in from around the world are here in Fayetteville, and are unbelievable people and it’s awesome. So I don’t know what people are complaining about. It is what it is.

And, I think things changed during COVID when the SAT scores for colleges kind of went away. A lot of colleges don’t use SATs now, so you get admitted like a normal student. And I think that’s one reason why you see an influx too; you just see kids where they don’t go the junior college route anymore. They come right to the 4-year universities.

T&FN: Let’s go back to 2008, when after 25 great years at Northern Iowa, you succeeded John McDonnell, arguably the most successful NCAA coach ever in all sports. Tell me how that went down.

Bucknam: Yeah, going back to spring of 2008 [at Northern Iowa], I can remember our assistant coach, Travis Geopfert, coming in and saying, “Hey, Coach McDonnell is retiring.” We were in the office and I said, “Oh, that’s cool,” and that was it. And then he goes, “Buck, stop for a second. This job is gonna open up.” And I go, “Great. What’s the lineup for this weekend? Where are we going?”

And he goes, “Coach, you don’t understand. This is opening up,” right? And, you know, “maybe you get a shot at this” or what have you. Probably my reaction was because I had interviewed and talked to 3–5 other power schools, over the past 10 years at that point, and I didn’t get one job. Nobody hired me.

And so it was kinda like, you know, always the bridesmaid, right? And never the bride. Somebody even had made a comment about that. So that was probably the reason for my reaction, like I’m just gonna be the bridesmaid again. So I kind of blew it off at first.

But one thing led to another. The NCAA meet happened to be in Des Moines. Somebody from Arkansas asked for my cell phone number and then I got a call from Athletic Director Jeff Long and Bev Lewis [a longtime Arkansas track coach and administrator, including women’s athletic director and vice-chancellor roles], and they just said, “Hey, we’d like to talk to you in Des Moines before the meet starts.”

Long, to his credit, was at the meet scouting. I met him at 11 o’clock in the morning and we had an interview walking through the neighborhood just outside of Drake Stadium. And then after that, he goes, “Hey, I’ll give you a call.” And I flew down to Fayetteville to check everything out and got offered the job.

We [Northern Iowa] ended up 11th at that NCAA meet. We had guys in the final in 400, the 800, the 1500, 4×4; we had a great meet, so I think that might have helped. That’s kind of how it went down. After that, when I got the job, it was pretty surreal.

T&FN: You mentioned in your retirement press conference, and I could tell how important it was to you, alumni like O’Mara and Reuben Reina and some of those others you said were really supportive in your early years. I was also thinking about how Dorian Ulrey followed you from Northern Iowa and then became the SEC T&F Athlete of the Year for two years in a row. How much did those things help with the transition?

Bucknam: Yeah, they did help a lot. Having Dorian come down, and we also had a great 800 runner and NCAA champ, Tyler Mulder, come with us as well. It was weird because Dorian wanted to follow me and maybe a few others did. It was a very, very difficult time emotionally for me because it was a team that we had built.

Dorian was younger than Tyler, so he had years ahead of him and Tyler had maybe one more year. It was a weird time, but Dorian coming in certainly helped with credibility for me as he was an outstanding middle distance runner and, I guess, it helped a little bit quell some thoughts of who this guy was from Northern Iowa getting the job?

Dorian ends up being an NCAA champion and helps us on many, many relays and just did a great job for us. When you get a job like this at this level, you know, it’s kind of like getting elected to the President of the United States: 40% are gonna think the AD hired the right person; 40% are thinking it was the absolute wrong kind of hire, OK? And then there’s about 20% in the middle that will see how it goes.

But I can tell you that Dave Swain, Frank O’Mara, James Karanu, Josphat Boit and Reuben Reina, there was a bunch of them, just said, “Hey, you’re our head coach now, we’re behind you 100%.” And I needed that. They were, maybe, the older guard that kind of knew the big picture, maybe more than the younger guard did, but it really was an inspiration to me that those guys would believe in me, and I did the best I could.

T&FN: Early in your Arkansas career you also had the family challenges of your wife being diagnosed with breast cancer and your son going to Afghanistan and serving there. How did you get through those tough times and what did you learn about yourself as a person and a coach during those years?

Bucknam: Well, all that happened right at the end of my first year. What I learned is that I just have a wonderful family and my wife is incredibly strong, despite these challenges she had. She knew what I was going through too, but it didn’t even come close to what she had to battle. So it just put things in perspective, that, “Hey, you know what? This is just college sports. It’s just a dumb job, really.” You can’t even measure to what my wife was going through. So, you know, what I thought at first was this big heavy load, was basically nothing after that.

And then one day we said, “Let’s go for a Sunday drive,” and then we get a call from the battalion that our son Eric was from. They were making calls to the parents, saying, “Hey, your son’s gonna get deployed, within the next three months.” So it put things in perspective and made me realize that, hey, you know what? This is a hard job, but it’s nothing compared to these other things.

So after that, my wife got healthy. My son did a tour, and did a phenomenal job with his unit, and came back healthy, and it worked out for us.

T&FN: Then in 2013 your team captured that first indoor national title, and then won a second one 10 years later. And before, during and after, a lot of those SEC triple crowns, and a lot of really close podium finishes at Nationals. I remember in your retirement news conference you were talking about those 2nd- and 3rd-place finishes, sometimes so agonizingly close that just missing can make you feel like jumping off the proverbial cliff sometimes.

Bucknam: Well, it’s the expectation, right? It’s the expectation of Arkansas to win and that was the thing. Our guys competed great. We did everything we could, the whole bit, but you’re so, so close, it’s just heart-wrenching for the kids and all of us, right? That 2013 championship, that came 4 or 5 years after we took over.

We’d built the thing back up to a championship level. It wasn’t like when I took over Arkansas was down in the dumps or anything like that. But I remember Track & Field News said it kind of eloquently one time… they had a story on 10 things for the new season can we look for and one of them was, “Can Coach Bucknam Rejuvenate Arkansas?”

It was one of those things where we were kind of in a rejuvenation thing when we won it, and we talk about the 2013 indoor championship, but everybody forgets the 2-point loss outdoors to Oregon. And so even last year, we were 3rd in cross country. We were 3rd indoor. We were 3rd outdoors. The indoor and outdoor championships I can count the points in one hand away from winning. And those were 3rd-place finishes!

I think we’ve been on the podium 16 or 18 times, and it just goes to show you in this day and age, it’s hard to win. So many things have to go right. That 2013 win was great, but I remember outdoors losing by a couple points, so there you go, right? [laughs]

T&FN: Thinking about those 2013 and 2023 teams, what were the biggest things that made them champions; what was unique and special about them?

Bucknam: I think I can speak for all of our teams, because nothing really changes between 2013 and even my team that finished 1 point out of it this year. We just have great competitors. We talk about competing all the time [laughs]. I don’t know. You’re asking me to get a little philosophical here.

T&FN: Tell me a little bit about that 2013 team and what made it special and unique. Let’s start there.

Bucknam: Well, they knew they were gonna win, I think. They had just had a lot of confidence. There were a lot of confident guys on the team and we gelled well together and you kind of get on a roll. Again, it’s what we talk about all the time: just don’t stop competing. Just compete and compete hard.… But sometimes I also have to say I don’t know how we do it [laughs], you know what I’m saying?

T&FN: Like you say, the 3–4 points that separate 1st from 3rd place can be just one single race or handoff, or one single jump or throw that turns it from a championship team that makes history into another that isn’t necessarily remembered the same way.

Bucknam: Right, I mean, we talk about it all the time, you just have to be a great finisher, and I guess those teams were great. You know, we had guys on the team that were great finishers. And you look at guys like Akheem Gauntlett or Neal Braddy on our 4×4 squad that won in 2013. You look at the pictures and the expression on their faces and everything, and it was just like… they were great finishers, OK? They could smell the finish line as they came down the stretch.

They were just great competitors. You try to get a whole team of them, if you can. And even teams that got 3rd or 4th, just to get to that level you have to be like that. So at the end of the day, it’s just guys that love to compete and couldn’t wait for the bright lights to come on.

T&FN: Going back for a minute to what we were talking about earlier, how things changed with the transfer portal, NIL and this year with the roster issues. When you think about the challenges the sport is facing, where do you feel like it’s heading in the near future?

Bucknam: Well, we’re just at this big pivot point right now with Olympic sports in general and in particular track & field, where our athletic directors are trying to figure it out, right? And you’ve got this monster that is sucking all the oxygen out of the room, and that’s football. Then you’ve got basketball, women’s sports, Title IX and all these things. So the ADs are trying to figure it out. And I think the worst thing that we can do as track & field coaches is bang our fists on the table and demand that we get this and we get that and woe-is-me type of thing.

I think that the best thing that we can do right now is to work with our athletic directors to get through this transition period and let things settle a little bit. And I think if we do that, then I think we’re gonna be in a better position to recover, so to speak.

And so as much as I don’t like what’s going on with the revenue share and who gets it, who doesn’t, and what scholarships you have and “well, this school has more than we have,” and “these guys get revenue share, we’re not getting it,” and all this kind of stuff. I think the best thing generally we could do is just be grateful that we’re alive and kicking.

And that goes back to that ceiling thing. That doesn’t mean you lower your ceiling, it just means that you just have a little bit more empathy for the guys in charge of trying to figure it out. I think when they do, and the dust settles, there can be some recovery. You see what I’m saying there?

T&FN: Yeah, definitely.

Bucknam: I think also that whenever there’s contraction, folks think it’s a bad thing. It’s really not a bad thing. There needs to be contraction. I go way back; I can remember when they instituted the 20-hour-a-week rule, maybe, what, 25 years ago? You couldn’t work out more than 20 hours a week, and all these Olympians are saying, “I can’t get to the Olympic Games — 20 hours a week isn’t enough.”

And it actually made us better coaches. You just had to be a better coach in a smaller time period. For the most part, the 20-hour rule that everybody thought was gonna be the death knell for Olympic sport ends up being better. So this contraction period that we’re going through, there’s gonna be some good that comes out of it for the sport.

T&FN: When you think about the hundreds of men whom you’ve coached at Arkansas, and not just the national champions and All-Americans, but others who provided different kinds of support and leadership, could you name a few who were real spark plugs or were especially memorable?

Bucknam: You’re gonna make me start naming names [laughs]?

T&FN: What are some of the interesting or unusual stories that might have felt disastrous at the time but you can laugh about now? Or athletes who stepped up and came through unexpectedly?

Bucknam: I don’t know. I guess I think of a guy like Jack Bruce who kind of epitomizes us at Arkansas. He was a 5000 runner and he was in that great NCAA championship race in Oregon [2017]. Grant Fisher ended up winning it and you had those other great runners there. Nobody really knew Jack’s name and he got 2nd — just missed winning, got beat by a stride, by Grant Fisher.

I just think of that guy that rises to that level, to compete, when nobody knew his name, right? And that kind of epitomizes, I think, a little bit of what our teams have been about. And that is just great competitors in rising to the occasion.

I think of James Benson at the NCAA Outdoor Championships and the SEC meet [2024] when we ran 2:58 and 2:59 in the 4×4, and whoever won that race won the conference meet between us, Florida, Texas A&M and Alabama. It was that close.

We had great legs from all of our guys, and then Benson dropped a 43.9 or 44-flat or something, some crazy split [44.18], and we needed that kind of run from him on the anchor, because we outleaned Alabama in the tape and won the SEC title. It took that kind of effort; he had to run that fast if we were to win… and he did it. I couldn’t believe it. It was just a phenomenal race.

Or there was the time at Ole Miss a couple years ago [2022] where at the SEC Championship we needed 11 points to win and we scored 24 points in the 5K. You know, just things like that. I just love how my teams competed, but I could give you 20 or 30 examples over the 18 years. And I can then go back to Northern Iowa and list a bunch of them there, too.

T&FN: Now one more thing: Starting January 1, you have an opportunity to do a lot of things you’ve been wanting to do for a long time, with your family and the rest of your life. For a guy who still feels pretty healthy and looks forward to many more years with your family, what’s on your calendar?

Bucknam: I think it’ll be, like I said, traveling to see my family, right? See our son and grandson in Houston and support Kate up at [K-State] and be able to go do that. I won’t be stuck in a vacation period where I have to get back. So at the end of the day, there’s no real special around the world trip or anything like that. It’s just spending time with my wife and just enjoy the company of my family.

My mom and dad, they live in Marblehead, north of Boston and I’ll go home for Christmas… and I won’t have to rush back on the 27th to start indoor track practice. We’ll go out there and we’ll buy 1-way tickets and then we’ll go home when we go home.

That’s kind of the thing. I don’t have any great hobbies; I’m not a woodworker or a golfer or anything like that. It’s just gonna be doing things that we want to do, taking some trips and having the freedom of staying. And I guess I’ll be the head coach of the family again, you know, and relieve my poor wife that has been the head coach for all these years.