Four years ago, when Oakland University established an intercollegiate track program, the athletic department’s first goal was simply to become competitive.

Complicating matters in pursuit of this goal, however, is the absence of a track and field facility on campus.

Track practice is currently held a few miles from the university at Avondale High School.

Many of Oakland’s track and field athletes are beginning to wonder if and when a track will be built on campus.

Senior Brandon Elliot competes in sprints and said he would like to see the university have its own track.

“It will really put more of a face on the program,” Elliot said.

In spring of 2011, OU will have the opportunity to host the Summit League Championship. All conference universities are put into the rotation whether they have their own track or not. According to head coach Paul Rice, if OU doesn’t have a facility by then, the university would have to rent a facility.

Rice said the program would like to be able to host the league meet and believes that track could also be utilized in other ways as well.

“The students can use it,” Rice said. “There are ways to host high school-level meets and different meets to bring in revenue.”

But the decision is not solely up to Rice. Although there have been discussions with the administration, the down economy is playing a major role in having the necessary funds.

“The university is not really in the position to build or put money up to build a track facility,” Rice said.

Tracy Huth, Oakland’s athletic director, said that while the goal is to eventually have on-campus facilities for all intercollegiate sports, no timetable currently exists for building a track.

“As the university has only recently added track, there was never a specific need for a facility,” Huth said. “In consideration of adding track, the ability to build a facility was cost prohibitive.”

“The decision to start a varsity track program was still a positive decision based on the ability to use local facilities,” Huth said.

The team started out with the majority of the athletes being distance runners who did not compete on a track.Now that the program has grown, it has gained more athletes who compete in sprints, hurdles and field events.

“We just wanted to get a program started at the track level and see how it evolved before we made any big-time investment into a track facility,” Rice said. “With the success we’ve had individually and as a team, not having a track facility hasn’t held us back.”

Junior Joe Suchoski competes in sprints as well and he knows some other track athletes who have decided to run for different universities because they had their own campus facilities.

“I think having a track would do wonders,” Suchoski said. “OU would recruit more heavily.”

The university currently has athletic facilities for many of its sports teams.

“There are always talks about adding things and trying to expand our facilities but we don’t have any concrete plans right now,” Rice said.

But this doesn’t mean Rice and his team aren’t talking about it. Rice said he doesn’t plan on leaving anytime soon and would like to see a track built in his time as a coach at OU.

“We’re a new program and I think we’re finally developed to the point where we have a really good student-athlete base with our track program now,” Rice said. “Obviously the next logical step to take our program to a new level is to have new facilities on campus.”

Although Rice said he would love to train on campus full time, he is content with the situation today.

“For now, it’s working out fine,” Rice said. “I know down the line, it’ll happen at some point.”

Oakland’s track team will travel to California this weekend for the Stanford Invitational.

Dan Fenner and Jared Purcell contributed to this report.