With mere weeks until the start of the 2019 NCAA cross country season, Stanford University has finally named their distance coach: former B.A.A. High Performance head coach and Iona Director of Cross Country and Track and Field Ricardo Santos.

Thank you @RicSantosSLB for guiding #TeamBAA since February, 2018. We wish you the best of luck at Stanford!?

Welcome to the @BAA @MUceny! The 2012 Olympian will increase her role & lead Team B.A.A. as Interim Head Coach.https://t.co/PijcjMyZa9

?https://t.co/xSaojqQGSb pic.twitter.com/4PI7rjJ7T0

— Team B.A.A. (@teambaa) August 27, 2019

The B.A.A. made the announcement on Tuesday, a somewhat surprising turn for Santos as he had only coached the Boston-area elite professional group since February of 2018. Before accepting the role at the Boston Athletic Association, Santos coached at Iona, his alma mater, for a decade. While there he led multiple athletes to national titles and many more to All-American honors.

Santos’ 11th-hour arrival to Palo Alto comes just over a month after J.J. Clark was announced as the Franklin P. Johnson Director of Track and Field. Clark replaced the departed Chris Miltenberg, who took the same position at the University of North Carolina.

Santos will inherit two deep rosters this fall at Stanford. Both programs finished fifth at nationals last year, and each squad will have podium aspirations despite the turnover of the coaching staff. The Cardinal men bring back six men who ran sub-14:00 for 5,000m in the spring.

Stanford's first meet this season is September 21 at the John McNichols XC Invitational in Terre Haute, Indiana.