Ivy League Track & FIeld: Why Sophia Gorriaran Chose Harvard

Ivy League Track And Field Recruiting

Last year, then senior Sophia Gorriaran chose Harvrad. Gorriaran narrowed her final five choices down to two, picking between the Texas Longhorns and the Harvard Crimson.

"I have decided on Harvard University," she told MileSplit. "I thought ultimately the location, the coaches, the team itself, from the academic standpoint and just the whole environment there, I thought that would be the best option for me."

Harvard has an indoor facility, too -- the Gordon Indoor Track -- and plenty of history, with Gabby Thomas, a 2019 graduate, earning a bronze at 200 meters at the Tokyo Olympics.

But athletics were not Gorriaran's sole focus, either.

With plans to earn a degree from one of the country's most prestigious universities, Gorriaran, MileSplit's third-ranked recruit in the Class of 2023, has focuses beyond the track. Ultimately, she wanted the best of both worlds.

"I think the combination between the academic piece and athletic piece narrowed it down for me," she said. "The combination at both of those schools would have been the best fit for me personally and to like grow as a person and an athlete. I like the environment for both schools, even though they're both different."

At Harvard, there are obvious pipelines to success in various fields of academics. But on the track, Gorriaran also has intentions of one day turning professional and running at the Olympics. She has hopes of training and competing with the best in the world.

The holder of a world U18 and U20 record in the outdoor 600m and another in the U18 category for the indoor 800m, those races place Gorriaran in elite company. She's run a lifetime best of 2:00.58 indoors, which places her second all-time; it's also a junior class record. She was the youngest female to ever run at the Olympic Trials in 2021 -- managing to do so when she was just 15, a few days shy of her birthday.

Over the recruiting process, she said, Harvard met eye-to-eye with her and her family on details surrounding her potential development over the next few years. She credited the coaches at Harvard -- Jason Saretsky, Alex Gibby, Kathy Newburry, among others -- as being communicative and helpful over the recruiting process.

"I think they played a pretty big role in my decision," she said. "I think Harvard was willing to give me a lot of individualized attention and put what's best for me definitely in the equation.

"I think just the individualized attention, the willingness to work with me and hearing what I had to say, was a big part of it."

Another part of the 17-year-old's choice was having quality infrastructure around her. She will be roughly an hour from her home of Providence, Rhode Island, and a few minutes from her brother, Max, who attends Boston University.

This also couldn't be discounted: Gorriaran felt like she could build a sisterhood with the Crimson.

After seeing the bond her sister Natasha formed with her University of Pennsylvania lacrosse teammates, Sophia felt like that was a priority in her choice, too.

"I just loved how they were really tight and they were really nice to each other and friends, which I loved," she said. "The distance girls and the sprint girls and the jumps girls were tight. I loved that about Harvard."

"I've been running since I was 3.5 or four," she said. "It's always been something that I've always loved. I love the challenge and competing against people. Honestly, whatever sport it is, I just love competing."