TSR Collaboration
Jan 20, 20216 min
TSR contributors may value certain aspects and ranking criteria differently between men and women when constructing our Indoor Top 25.
West Texas A&M had a very good weekend at the Texas Tech Corky Classic. Both Butare Rugenerwa and Arnaud Taki now sit at the top of the NCAA D2 800 meter leaderboard, owning altitude-converted times of 1:51.17 and 1:51.45, respectively. Those aren't necessarily amazing marks, but they're strong performances for a season debut and they put both men on the fringe of national qualifying.
We knew that Jake Norris and Reece Smith were two respectable distance talents for NW Missouri, but we just weren't prepared to see them run as well as they did in their season opener. Norris dropped a very strong time of 4:08 in the mile this past weekend while teammate Reece Smith (formerly of Iowa) wasn't far behind with a time of 4:09.
Just like Butare Rugenerwa and Arnaud Taki in the men's 800 meters, those times are probably not enough to put Norris or Smith into the national meet. Still, those are strong starts to their seasons and it positions them well for the future.
The Crimson & Gold Invitational gave us an excellent 3k battle which resulted in plenty of fast times. Colorado Christian ace Josh Pierantoni was the overall winner in a time of 8:16, taking down Missouri Southern's Ryan Riddle who finished with a time of 8:18.
Noah Metzer (Dallas Baptist) and Evan Del Rio (Mississippi College) also ran times of 8:19 and 8:20, respectively, giving us what was likely one of the better distance races of the young D2 season.
After a strong cross country season, Pierantoni is maintaining his momentum and clearly keeping his fitness at a high level. Taking down a guy like Riddle is no joke and we're eager to see what he ends up doing next.
Was not ranked the week before.
First number indicates how much the individual has moved in the rankings.
The second number indicates where they were ranked the week before.
The redshirt freshman had a stellar debut for GVSU at the Bob Eubanks Open this past weekend. Futter took home the win in the mile over teammates Dennis Mbuta and Connor Schwartz in a time 4:06, giving him an NCAA provisional mark.
While it’s still early in the season, Futter’s effort is undeniably good and it makes us wonder what else he has in store for the rest of this winter. Futter currently sits at NCAA #2 on the national leaderboard in the mile behind only Lee University’s Christian Noble. He's already in excellent company and the fact that he took down two established names in Mbuta and Schwartz is impressive.
We knew Blake Jones was good. He did, after all, win the GLVC cross country title this past fall. However, seeing him run a new personal best of 8:08 for 3000 meters in his season debut en route to wins over Isaac Harding and Tanner Chada is awfully impressive.
Jones appears to have a ton of momentum right now and he has secured wins over top talents who we view very highly. Between his recent conference cross country title victory, a big season debut over top-tier talents and a strong time that puts him atop of the national leaderboard, there was no way we could leave Jones off of these rankings.
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Connor Schwartz had a solid 2021 indoor debut with his teammates in the mile this past weekend. Schwartz notched a respectable time of 4:10 at the Bob Eubanks Open, finishing behind teammates Caleb Futter and Dennis Mbuta.
Schwartz’s time gives him an NCAA provisional mark in his non-primary event, as his best racing distance has historically been the 3000 meters. This just goes to show that Schwartz is in pretty decent shape and it could also signal a strong 3k performance from him in the near future.
This is a guy who gained a ton of momentum throughout last winter and with a race like this, Schwartz is setting himself up to do the exact same thing in 2021. At the very least, Schwartz hasn’t lost his leg-turnover and that's a good sign moving forward.
Chada secured an indoor national qualifying mark last year before cancellations and his 2021 season debut has him on track to do so again. Despite Chada grabbing a 3rd place finish this past weekend, his performance was still a good one.
The junior dropped a time of 8:14 for 3000 meters, finishing behind teammate Isaac Harding, a graduate transfer from the University of Michigan, and Blake Jones, a senior from Illinois-Springfield who’s coming off of a GLVC title-winning cross country season. Neither of them are runners to be scoffed at, and neither is Chada.
It's not a perfect performance and it would have been nice to see Chada get the win, but it's still somewhat early in the season and we're not going to overreact to a rust-busting performance.
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Julian was left out of our preseason rankings by mistake. That one's on us.
He enters the rankings this high because he’s one of the most well-rounded athletes in the country, although he didn't compete last winter, didn't have a 2020 outdoor track season (like everyone else) and raced only twice during the 2019 cross country season.
The last time we saw Julian compete on the indoor oval, he ran an unreal anchor leg to help the Orediggers finish 3rd as a team in the DMR at the NCAA Championships. On day two of the national meet, he finished 5th in the 3000 meters with a time of 8:14.
His mile PR is "only" 4:09, but don’t be fooled as he has run 3:44 for 1500 meters and 14:10 for 5000 meters on the outdoor oval. He also owns a heavily converted mile time of 4:01 from the 2019 indoor track season.
Julian is fresh off of a shortened cross country season where he finished 8th at the RMAC Championships and if he’s anywhere near the kind of shape that he was in when we last saw him, he’ll be a force to be reckoned with.
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Admittedly, it was odd seeing Mbuta finish 2nd behind his teammate Caleb Futter in the mile this past weekend. However, we can just chalk that up to this being his first race back in almost a full year. That being said, 4:09 is still respectable and it doesn't dilute his overall resume by any means.
Mbuta will certainly run faster in the coming weeks as this was more of a rust-buster when you consider that Grand Valley State did not have a cross country season. Expect Mbuta to flex his true talent in his next few races as he attempts to remind us all of where he should be in our rankings.
Running the fourth-best time in D2 history over the course of a mile will raise the stock of an athlete, drastically. A time of 4:00.60 speaks for itself at the Division Two level and it puts Noble in an elite, all-time category.
After this past weekend, Noble has cemented himself as a favorite in whichever discipline he wants to focus on. There’s talk of an attempt at the 5k indoor record in the coming weeks and he’s scheduled to go to Camel City in February for a fast 3k.
Noble’s stock? Yeah, it’s climbing and it's possible that he is still nowhere near his peak.
Luke Julian (Colorado MInes)
Caleb Futter (Grand Valley State)
Arnaud Taki (West Texas A&M)
Jhordan Ccope (NW Missouri)
Vincent Workman (Colorado Mines)
Isaac Harding (Grand Valley State)
Arnaud Taki (West Texas A&M)
Jhordan Ccope (NW Missouri)
Isaiah Rodarte (Adams State)
Ryan Talbott (Saginaw Valley State)
Ryan Riddle (Missouri Southern)
Austin MIller (Augustana (S.D.))
Nathan Hood (CSU-Pueblo)
Jake Norris (NW Missouri)
Yannick Duppich (Queens (N.C.))
Shane Bracken (Saint Leo)
Braden Reichl (Michigan Tech)
Carlee Stimpfel (Saginaw Valley State)
Afewerki Zeru (UC-Colorado Springs)
Butare Rugenerwa (West Texas A&M)
Reece Smith (NW Missouri)
Josh Pierantoni (Colorado Christian)