On May 24, on the Illinois track infield, there lay an unusual sight.
Michigan multi-event star Tania Longe was huddled, the frame of her body - a physique appropriate for great classical Greco-Roman sculpture - shaking as tears ran down her face.
She was not crying because she was dissatisfied with her performance at the Big Ten championships that day - indeed, winning the heptathlon and placing in the top six in four other events couldn't possibly inspire sorrow.
Instead, Longe was upset because Michigan coach James Henry refused to let her in another event, the mile relay.
Longe was disappointed, not because she was tired of doing so much, but because she wanted to do even more.
In all, Longe accounted for 29 of Michigan's 111 points and set a Big Ten record in the long jump, notching a distance of 6.6 meters in the heptathlon.
At the NCAA championships a week and a half later, the situation couldn't have been more different.
Longe failed to even qualify for the finals in the long jump and placed a mediocre 13th in the heptathlon with a score of 5,231 - more than 600 points less than her score at Big Tens.
Longe has never had a successful run at NCAAs. She finished 15th in the triple jump in the indoor championships earlier this year, ninth in the heptathlon in the 1996 outdoors and 10th in the 1995 outdoors.
And the reason for Longe's problematic trend at NCAAs is as clear as the tears that ran down her face at Big Tens.
As much as it pained her to not be able to give everything she had for her team at Big Tens, that level of passion - the drive to not let her teammates down - pushed her to the incredible level of success she achieved that weekend.
On the other hand, competing on the national level requires a more individual focus, perhaps even selfish one.
When it comes down to it, at NCAAs each Wolverine is out there for herself, competing for personal glory. Don't think that Longe doesn't want to win on an individual level - to say so would be a discredit to such an intense competitor.
But Longe pulls the most out of herself as an individual when she is fighting for the rest of her team.
"Tania is a team person," Henry said. "At the nationals, there's no one there. She's out there on an island by herself, and the team isn't depending on her."
Until Longe starts to enjoy being on that island, expect a lot more success at the Big Ten level, but the same lackluster achievement at the national level.