Miami Redhawks

De'Sean Turner was named Miami's head cross country coach and associate head track and field coach in August 2024. He initially joined the RedHawks' coaching staff prior to the 2017-18 season as an assistant coach.

Turner has helped develop Miami’s distance group over the past eight years. Highlights of Turner’s time in Oxford include men’s cross country team titles in 2018 and 2022 (with a top-three team finish every year of his tenure), as well as RedHawks sweeping the men’s and women’s individual titles at the 2022 MAC meet for the first time ever (Obsaa Feda and Carmen Riano). Miami also claimed the men’s outdoor track title in the spring of 2021.
 
The Miami men took second at the 2024 MAC Cross Country Championships, with the women placing ninth. The women’s indoor track team came in seventh at last season’s MAC meet, while both the men and women placed fifth at the conference’s outdoor championships. Abby Suszek rewrote the Miami record books in her senior year, breaking the indoor records in the 200m, 300m and 400m and claiming gold in the 400m at the MAC Championships during both the indoor and outdoor seasons. Ella Scally also won gold in the long jump at the MAC Indoor Championships, marking the first time since 2011 the RedHawks captured first place in multiple individual events at that meet. Scally was one of five Miami student-athletes to qualify for the NCAA East First Round during the outdoor season and went on to earn All-American recognition (Honorable Mention) in the long jump, finishing 22nd at the national championships. The RedHawks earned a total of 11 All-MAC awards and 64 Academic All-MAC honors in 2024-25, producing three Academic All-District performers.
 
The RedHawk men finished third in the MAC Cross Country Championships the previous season, while Miami’s women came in eighth, with the programs combining for four All-MAC honorees. During the indoor track season, the RedHawk women posted a second consecutive top-five team finish at the 2024 MAC Championships for the first time in more than a decade, including an additional individual All-MAC recognition. Miami’s women also finished in the top five at the MAC Outdoor Championships in the spring, with the men coming in seventh, as the RedHawks earned seven All-MAC outdoor honors and produced three NCAA East First Round qualifiers. The Red and White collected 60 Academic All-MAC awards between cross country, indoor track and outdoor track, along with two Academic All-District selections.
 
The 2022-23 season saw Miami produce a collection of eight First-Team and 11 Second-Team All-MAC picks between cross country, indoor track and outdoor track. Three RedHawk runners brought home NCAA All-American accolades (Ava Nuttall, second team in 10K; Carmen Riano and Charlie Harders, honorable mention in steeplechase), and Patrick Wills (cross country) was the MAC Men’s Freshman of the Year. The RedHawks also qualified for a total of 42 Academic All-MAC honors and 10 Academic All-District awards. Miami runners won MAC titles in the women’s 3,000m (indoor), men’s and women’s steeplechase (outdoor), 5K (outdoor) and 10K (outdoor), while the women’s indoor track team posted its first top-five MAC finish since 2012.
 
In 2021-22, Miami’s track teams took fourth place (men) and fifth place (women) at the MAC outdoor championships. Finley Mclear won the men’s 800, while Charlie Harders (steeplechase) and Carmen Riano (steeplechase, 5000) picked up individual titles. Seven Miami student-athletes competed in the NCAA East prelims, highlighted by Riano, who advanced to the national meet and finished as an All-American in the steeplechase (14th place). During the 2022 indoor season, Charlotte Roemer won the mile to highlight Miami’s performance at the MAC championships, while the team finished seventh in the league.  The cross country campaign featured a pair of top-three MAC team finishes, as the women took second place and the men came in third. 62 different RedHawks were recognized as Academic All-MAC between cross country, indoor track and outdoor track.

The 2020-21 academic year was highlighted by the RedHawk men finishing first in the conference’s outdoor track championships. Miami produced a MAC individual champion in the women’s indoor pentathlon (Sarah Bruns) and a myriad of MAC outdoor champions. Olivia Bechtel won the 200 and 400 at the MAC meet that spring, Charlie Harders won the steeplechase, Sean Torpy won the 1500, Finley Mclear won the 800, and Miami’s 4x400 relay team also took first place. The RedHawks also fared exceedingly well on the national stage, with Finley Mclear taking second in the indoor 800m and 4th in the outdoor 800m. The RedHawks’ DMR team (Sean Torpy, Luke Finnegan, Andrew Schroff, Chris Torpy) picked up All-American honors as well, claiming eighth at the NCAA indoor championships. In addition, Sean Torpy became Miami’s first Academic All-American since 2008.
 
Other accomplishments during Turner’s time at Miami include Sean Torpy winning the 800, 1500, and 5000 races in the 2019 MAC Outdoor Championships, earning Men’s Most Valuable Performer. Both Torpy brothers went on to become NCAA All-Americans that spring: Sean was 17th in the nation in the 800, and Chris was 14th in the 1500. In 2018, Miami took first place in two men’s (800, 1500) and two women’s (10,000, 4x400 relay) outdoor track events, and Maria Scavuzzo was credited with the Most Outstanding Performance (women’s) at the meet. Chris Torpy also took 23rd place in the 1,500m at the national championships that spring, becoming an All-American for the first time.
 
Turner was recognized as MAC Men’s Co-Assistant Coach of the Year in 2018.
 
He joined the RedHawks’ coaching ranks on the heels of a fine collegiate and professional career. As a student-athlete at Indiana, Turner was a six-time All-American, earning first-team honors and scoring points for IU in five of the NCAA Championships he competed in. He helped the Hoosiers score indoors in the distance medley in 2009, 2010 and 2012 while earning individual All-American status outdoors in the steeplechase from 2010-12, finishing as high as sixth as a junior in 2011.

After graduating from IU, Turner competed professionally from 2012 through 2016 as a member of Team Indiana Elite and later for Hoka One One. He was a member of Team USA at the 2013 USA Track & Field World Championships, where he competed in the steeplechase. He also served as a volunteer assistant for Team Indiana Elite during the 2015-16 season before ultimately becoming the head cross country coach, assistant track and field coach and strength coordinator at Warren Central High School in Indianapolis.

Turner graduated from Indiana with a Bachelor’s Degree in Telecommunications in 2012 and later earned a Master’s Degree in Applied Sport Science from IU in 2016.