College track and field is incredibly competitive but it’s also very predictable. The best teams in Division 1 dominate year in and year out because they tend to get all the top recruits to put on their uniform. The men of Texas Tech right now have 4 sprinters ranked inside the top 10 of the NCAA in the 60 meter dash alone. That means they could run half of the NCAA championship final by themselves. So don’t get it twisted, there might be nearly 300 D1 track programs out there, but it’s really not a fair fight when all the best recruits line up wearing the same uniforms. So if a top recruit ever chooses to break the mold, and run for a team that nobody pays much attention to it is not just rare, but almost unheard of.

In 2024 Ethan Exilhomme is ranked second in the entire nation in the 60 meter hurdles, with a man who runs for Texas Tech ranked immediately ahead of him in first, and another ranked just below in third. But Ethan doesn’t run in the Big 12, or the SEC, or even the Big Ten. He runs for Northeastern University in the Coastal Athletic Association, better known as the CAA. The truth is that Ethan Exilhomme was one of the best hurdling prospects in the recruitment class for 2021. But there is a reason why Texas Tech wasn’t checking for him in recruiting. Because his journey to the top of the rankings was something nobody would have seen coming after his junior year of high school. But now he has a chance to not only win a national championship at Northeastern, but prove their coaches right for believing in him back when nobody else did!

How did Ethan Exilhomme get recruited to Northeastern? 

Ethan Exilhomme’s story stands out because on the one hand, the big schools had to see him coming. But the problem is they didn’t notice him until Ethan decided it was way too late. At the high school level Ethan would have rated as a high 2 star recruit at the end of his junior year of high school. That’s good enough to get into D1 at a lesser known D1 program like Northeastern. But his junior year of high school was in 2020 where he never got to prove what he was capable of. That is a big deal because junior year is normally when most boys break out as recruits. It’s what happened to me when I was in high school, and without that season, I would have never gotten into D1 at all. He likely went through his recruiting process, surveyed the options he had and chose Northeastern, which was in his home state and a solid D1 track team from a lesser known conference. College coaches recruit you primarily off of the performances you put out by the end of junior year. Remember the signing period begins in November of senior year, when no track races are being run. Of course your senior year track season can be a big one for many recruits, but it’s just too late on the calendar for most coaches to find you, recruit you, and get you to commit. 

However, during Ethan’s senior year something crazy happened. He jumped all the way up from a 2 star recruit to a 5 star level recruit. He got way faster with hurdles and without. He then finished the season as the second fastest 110 hurdler in the nation if you control for wind legal times. That would have been good enough to write his ticket to any program in D1 if he was that good 1 season prior. But Ethan had already chosen the Northeastern Huskies, but more importantly they chose him, even before he had proved himself to be that good. That must be the real reason why he has not only shown up for them but showed out, year in and year out when the transfer portal honestly gave him a chance to leave.

Ethan Exilhomme’s rise as one of the best hurdlers in college

In reality Northeastern track and field is a quality program in the CAA conference. They win their conference a lot of the time, and went back to back indoors and outdoors in 2023. The only reason you haven’t heard of them is because the CAA is not as popular as the ACC, even if the letters are similar. But the moment Ethan got to Northeastern he proved his new 5 star ranking was not a fluke. He went second in the conference indoors and outdoors in the short hurdles, and second outdoors at the IC4A championship meet. For the record it’s basically like track and field’s version of the NIT in basketball. He made the NCAA East regional meet, but didn’t qualify out so nobody really remembered that he was there. 

As a sophomore in 2023 he cranked it up a notch to be one of the fastest sprinters in the entire CAA even without the hurdles. He ranked third in the conference in the 200 meter indoors, was the fastest 60 meter dash runner without hurdles, and then won the conference meet with them. But the first true warning shot that Ethan Exilhomme was ready for the big time was when he made the 110 hurdle finals at the Texas relays. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that he won the CAA in the 110 hurdles went back to the regional meet, and this time took care of business. That is how Ethan Exilhomme made it to the NCAA championship meet. However he was eliminated in the semifinals so most people still didn’t notice.

That brings us to what just happened. At this moment Ethan Exilhomme is now running like every bit of the 5 star recruit that he is. He dropped 7.60 seconds in the 60 hurdles to validate that and become a real threat to win the NCAA indoor championship. In reality it is. Not a shock for the second fastest hurdler in his high school class to become one of the fastest in college years later. The only reason nobody is expecting Ethan to do it is because of the uniform he continues to wear. The big schools didn’t want Ethan back when he was only a 2 star recruit. But Northeastern, which actually takes track seriously, even if they don’t normally get 4 and 5 star recruits, saw value in him from the start. He not only chose to go, but to stay put with the team and the coaches who believed in him, when he could have transferred his way out to the SEC, Big Ten, or even Texas Tech in the Big 12.

The Bottom Line

It is unclear what will happen to Ethan Exilhomme going forward. But I can tell you what is supposed to happen. Five star recruits are supposed to dominate at the college level. Ethan has already started doing that in the CAA, but that is only the beginning. He is supposed to win on almost any track against any team in the NCAA. The leaderboards right now are proof of it. So ignore the name of the team if you must, but focus on the man who’s hurdling in their uniform. Ethan Exilhomme is a real threat to win an NCAA championship this season. Some might even say he is a favorite. The only reason he is an underdog to now, is because he competes for the Huskies. But they dominate their conference, and have gotten used to doing it. So now Ethan gives them a chance to give a dose of it to everyone else in the NCAA.

LOOK GOOD, FEEL GOOD, RUN GOOD.

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