The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

THE University of the Bahamas, in preparation for its affiliation with a major athletic conference in the United States, will be taking their track and field team to West Lafayette, Indiana, this weekend.

The 18-member contingent, now coached by Rupert Gardiner assisted by Ednol Rolle, will be competing in the Fred Wilt Open on Saturday. The team is scheduled to leave town on Friday and return home on Sunday.

“This is the very first indoor meet that the University of the Bahamas will be competing in,” Gardiner said. “The reason we’re going to these indoor meets is we’ve put in our application for membership in the NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) and so we have to do the qualifying standards to go to their National Championships.”

Rolando ‘Lonnie’ Greene, the head coach at Purdue, said he was happy to be able to assist UB in their quest to move forward with their athletic programme.

“At the end of the day, I’m a Bahamian by birth and everything else,” he said. “That’s giving back to a system that helped to develop me and nurture me to the point that I am at. The Lord has blessed me, so why not bless someone else from the Bahamas. I could easily have extended it to any college or university in the United States, but when I got to talking to Rupert, he was trying to build his indoor season, so I told him let’s try to get him out here and worked things out so now they are coming. I’m excited about that.”

The home meet for the Boilermakers will be quite small, according to Greene, who is assisted by Bahamian Norbert Elliott. But he promised that the UB athletes would all run very fast.

During their trip, Greene said he will host the team to a dinner at his home where they will get a chance to interact on a more personal basis with the Bahamian athletes who compete for Purdue and others who are studying there.

“I am hoping that this will be a partnership that we can develop going forward,” Greene said. “Hopefully when the University of the Bahamas hosts a meet in the Bahamas in 2018, I can bring our men and women teams there to compete.

“I hope that this can become a great partnership because with us coming, maybe some other schools in the United States would want to jump onto that and we can develop a good relationship.”

Expected to be joining Purdue and UB in the meet are Western Kentucky, Northern Illinois, Butler University, UPEI (University of Prince Edward Island) and Middleton University.

“Being the first indoor meet for us, I think the athletes will do very well,” Gardiner projected. “Some of them have never competed indoors and they have never seen an indoor track. So I’m looking for some great expectations for the athletes. They have been training and they are looking good.”

Gardiner expressed his gratitude to Greene for working with UB in getting their team to travel to the meet.

On February 11, UB will travel to Kansas City to compete in another indoor meet.

“We will do two indoor meets to get our feet wet and then we will get ready for the outdoor season where we intend to compete in a series of meets in Florida,” Gardiner revealed.