A track coach’s friendship helped Villanova’s Marco Langon become a champion
As a troubled teen, Langon met rival coach Rob DeFillipis and a mentorship bloomed. "He helped me look at a lot of bright sides,” the star runner says.
For collegiate runners, not every race is going to be good, and not every meet is going to be successful.
For Villanova’s Marco Langon, though, mediocrity is not an option.
“I really don’t have the luxury to be allowed to fail,” the record-setting distance man said. “I need to push myself past what’s expected of me.”
The junior has adopted that mentality during his time as a Wildcat. But it stems from more than just wanting to win.
“I think going out and running for a maximum of 15 minutes, or however long the event is, is nowhere near as hard as all the things that I had to do growing up,” Langon said. “So I don’t think that there’s really anything that I can’t do when it comes to the sport.”
A crucial meeting
While Langon has his sights set on breaking records on the track, his struggles away from the sport have persisted for years.
“I didn’t grow up with a lot of luxuries a lot of people had,” he said. “I grew up not knowing my real father, and that was something that drove me to want to prove that I’m better than what people may have thought I was.”
Cue Rob DeFilippis.
DeFilippis is a high school track and field coach at Red Bank Catholic who also owns Runner’s High, a sneaker store based nearby in central New Jersey.
Langon never competed for DeFilippis. In fact, it wasn’t until Langon’s sophomore year of high school at Bridgewater-Raritan that the two even met. And DeFilippis only agreed to meet Langon as a favor.
DeFilippis said he received a call from his orthopedic surgeon, Gerardo Goldberger, who had treated him for a stress fracture he had suffered while running.
“He tells me about Marco … and I go, ‘That’s great, but that’s not what I do,’” he said. “‘I don’t coach kids privately. You know that.’ And he goes, ‘No. This kid needs you.’”
DeFilippis agreed to a meeting, but was the last place Langon wanted to be.
“At that point, I just wanted to drop out of high school,” Langon said. “I didn’t want to do anything in my life. I just wanted to work in the kitchen and move to France and become a Michelin star chef.”
Weeks later, Langon and his mother showed up at Runner’s High. DeFilippis and Langon headed to the back of the shop, and they talked for the first time.
“After I get done talking, I go back to his mom, and I said, ‘Marco needs a friend,’” DeFilippis said. “’ … He needs somebody to talk to and bounce stuff off and just guide him. And I’m happy to do that.’”
That conversation happened on Nov. 13, 2020.
“I opened up to him about how I grew up and about my life,” Langon said. “He could kind of tell, from the moment that I met him, that there were a lot of things going on and that I just needed a friend. And he knew that there was a time where he was going to have to step in and be that role model for me to look up to.”
Five years later, DeFilippis is now more of a father to Langon than a friend. In their meetings, the coach offered pointers on running and life.
“He’s always in contact with my mom and my sister, and I’m close with his kids, too,” Langon said. “It’s just something I’ve kind of always wanted to have, which was a real, whole family. Rob gave me that and helped me look at a lot of bright sides.”
In his senior year of high school, Langon won the NJSIAA Meet of Champions in cross-country and became a first-team All-American at the Foot Locker Cross Country Nationals.
Bigger than breaking records
Langon is no stranger to success.
In 2024, he ran the third leg (3 minutes, 58.18 seconds) of Villanova’s 4xMile relay, which recorded the second-fastest time ever (15:51.91) and set collegiate, Penn Relays, Big East, and Villanova records.
As a six-time All-Big East performer in cross-country, indoors, and outdoors, Langon won a Team USA bronze medal at the world championships and ranks second in Villanova history in the 3,000 meters (7:37.87).
“After races, I definitely would have some people … college runners, Division II, Division II runners or kids that are in high school [ask] me for advice or a picture or an autograph,” Langon said.
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On March 27, Langon and teammate Liam Murphy posted the top two times in NCAA history in the 1,500 meters at the Raleigh Relays in North Carolina. Murphy set an NCAA record in 3:33.02 and Langon was a close second in 3:33.38.
But regardless of the accolades, Langon’s autograph isn’t what he wants his legacy to be. He wants more.
“I’m not saying I want to be famous or anything,” said Langon, a communication major. “I don’t care about that. I want to be able to make an impact on kids.”
And that impact is something he wants to make away from the track.
“My short-term goal is to win a national title in March, and my future goal is to win an Olympic gold medal,” Langon said. “But my long-term goal is to have an impact on people who kind of grew up [underserved] and didn’t come from the best background. I want to be able to be someone that people could look up to and say, ‘Damn, you know what? If this kid could do it. … He’s nothing special, I can do the same exact thing.’”