2022 D2 Outdoor Top 25 Rankings (Men): Update #1

Additional commentary by Garrett Zatlin

Click here to see our Just Missed names, Honorable Mention names and Notes.

Listed eligibility takes redshirts and Covid-related extensions into consideration.

TFRRS is used as a general guide when determining eligibility.

Was not ranked in our last update.

First number indicates how much the individual has moved in the rankings.

The second number indicates where they were ranked in our last update.

A respectable finish to Julian's indoor track season, where he earned a 6th place All-American finish in the mile, was solid. However, Julian likely wanted more.

This past weekend, he ran 3:48 for 1500 meters at the Stanford Invite. That was another respectable result, but you can tell that there is still so much more that this Colorado Mines star can offer.

With a 4:00 mile personal best, we're happy to keep Julian in these rankings, although we're confident that he has more to offer.

Few men in D2 gained more momentum than Franks did at the end of the indoor track season. He was showed off incredible 800 meter speed (which produced an All-American finish) and excellent mile strength.

On the outdoor oval, Franks has picked up right where he left off. At the Mike Fanelli Track Classic, Franks put together a surprisingly strong weekend double of 3:47 for 1500 meters and 8:52 in the steeplechase. He later ran 1:52 for 800 meters at a separate meet that weekend.

Franks has tremendous versatility and can seemingly be a nationally competitive name in almost any distance event. He's also a workhorse and this past weekend is great evidence of that.

It's hard to find a flaw on his resume right now.

Has yet to race this spring.

A solid finish to Zeru's indoor track season, earning All-American honors in the 5k, catapulted him to a 28:56 (10k) personal best at the Stanford Invite.

Zeru is another name whose stock in our rankings rises thanks to the introduction of a longer racing distance. On paper, the 10k is his best event, meaning that his value has to rise, at least for right now.

This UCCS star looks like he's on a different level than last year, so while his outdoor track season from 2021 may not make him a top returner this spring, it's fair to say that those marks aren't a good indicator of what he's actually capable of doing over the next two months.

Cardenas is slowing rounding into an extremely balanced middle distance athlete. He wasted no time getting on the outdoor oval at the Dr. Dan Capriogolio Early Bird meet at CSU-Pueblo where we saw him run 3:51 for 1500 meters (not converted).

Two weeks later, Cardenas headed to Grand Junction where he ran 3:48 and 1:51 for 1500 meters and 800 meters, respectively. After the conversion, Cardenas is sitting pretty with the NCAA #7 time (3:43.84) for 1500 meters.

However, for as good as that mark is, it is more than likely that he’ll continue to focus on the 800 meters, but these 1500 times are creating a solid base for him in that event.

We would still like to see Cardenas run fast at sea level as he has never broken the 1:50 barrier and that will need to change for him to be any kind of title threat in the 800 this outdoor season.

Even so, his resume is getting harder and harder to ignore.

The last time we saw Cohen on the track was at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in 2021 when he finished 9th place in the 800 meters. Since then, Cohen has improved his endurance and his speed in an effort finish higher than 9th this season.

After debuting with a a triple at the Tampa Track Classic (1:53, 3:54 and a 4x400 leg), Cohen really showed his colors at the Tampa Distance Classic all the way back in early March. The Spartan athlete dropped a cool 1:48.50 mark for 800 meters for a new personal best and a victory in the process.

That time is still the NCAA #3 time in D2 this year and it's basically a lock to get into the national meet.

However, with that standout time comes two questions: Did Cohen just run his fastest race in early March and plateau before May? Or is this a sign of things to come for Cohen who could be considered an early dark horse title candidate?

Only time will tell, but we should have our answer in May.

It’s good to see Stimpfel back at the distance that he is likely the most comfortable with.

At the Raleigh Relays he ran 29:08 for 10,000 meters, good enough for a 10-second improvement from his 2021 outdoor performances.

Stimpfel didn’t see the same success as other D2 athletes in this field, but an improvement is an improvement nonetheless. With a time that is likely secure him a spot for the national meet, Stimpfel can now hit the track for some faster races and improving his tactical prowess.

His personal best of 13:45 for 5000 meters is from 2021 and that’s in jeopardy of falling the next time he toes the line for that distance.

We're not sure where the Cardinal ace fits into the title contenders, but we do know that he’s a threat for a top-eight bid and those chances should only go up as the season goes on.

It’s not often that you seen an athlete set a personal best of 1:49.57 and finish 2nd place, especially in a race located in Kearney, Nebraska. However, that was exactly the case here for Maier as he took home runner-up honors in a race that featured Wes Ferguson and Ethan Lang.

As for Maier, this is a huge success for him. It’s an outright personal best and it solidifies him as an All-American contender in the 800 meters. We saw a breakout season for the sophomore during the winter and we were only expecting more from him this spring.

This is a great start.

Have yourself a day, Jan Lukas. He was one of many D2 athletes to head to the Raleigh Relays and walk away with a personal best. At that meet, Becker ran 28:27 for 10,000 meters and knocked off 48 seconds off of his personal best while at it.

It comes as no surprise to see Becker thriving in a race that has doubled the longest available distance from indoors to outdoors. What does come as a surprise is how close he was to Isaac Harding in this race. Just two seconds behind the Laker harrier is a huge confidence builder in the grand scheme of things.

Currently Becker holds the NCA #3 time in Division Two this year and is a lock to get into the national meet. With nearly two months left to go in the season, there is plenty of time for Becker to continue to improve his stock and show his true level of competitiveness before the national stage.

However, his ability to translate his greatest success to the national stage will be the biggest aspect of his to monitor.

Coca has already had a better outdoor track season in 2022 than he did for all of 2021.

He started out his season with an uneventful race at the Occidental Distance Carnival, running 14:08 for 5000 meters. That was solid, but not amazing. However, that’s not why he finds himself here at TSR #15 in our rankings.

Most recently, Coca took aim at the 1500 meters with back-to-back performances in consecutive weeks. First, he ran 3:50 at the Dr. Dan Capriogolio Early Bird meet which converted down to 3:45. Then, this past weekend, we saw Coca take it up another notch as he ran 3:46 in Grand Junction, Colorado.

After conversions, he has the NCAA #1 time this season in the 1500 meters and he is the only one under the 3:42 mark.

If we took all the converted times out, including Coca’s mark, his 3:46 would be the third-fastest raw time this season, leaving him in good company.

It’ll be interesting to see what event Coca pursues this spring as he likely can run much faster than the 14:08 mark that he ran early-on. Like most 1500 runners with strength, there’s a good possibility that we can see him in both the 1500 meters and the 5000 meters when the declared lists come out in late May.

Chada promptly dropped 31-seconds off of his 10k personal best when it was all over with at the Raleigh Relays. He crossed the line in a mark of 28:46 and that was also the first time he had broken the 29:00 barrier in his career.

This is not a bad run by any means. It’s currently the NCAA #4 time on the national leaderboard and it places Chada squarely in the middle of the contenders for this year’s 10k crown. However, it's going to be one of the deepest events of the year when we get to the May and it will come down who has consistently run well throughout the spring.

Chada thrives in the longer races and that was evident when he placed 2nd at the cross country national meet this past fall. We are waiting to see a true breakout on the track and this may have just been the beginning.

Has not yet raced this spring.

This is an extremely challenging name to rank and there isn't necessarily a good answer for where he fits into our top-25. Mutai was excellent during the winter months, running 7:58 (3k) and 13:41 (5k). Not only that, but he returns to this outdoor track season as the defending champion in the 10k, making him that much more valuable in our rankings.

After all, the 10k is likely his best distance.

However, Mutai really struggled at the indoor national meet in both of his races. He failed to place any higher than 12th place in either event. Not only that, but the 10k scene within Division Two is growing increasingly more competitive. Relative to Mutai's ranking, that doesn't exactly help his cause.

Even so, Mutai was too good in the 10k last year and too consistent during the regular season this past winter to not be a factor this spring. A lot of his ranking will be how he delivers on the national stage, but for the most part, no one should really be doubting his overall fitness.

The Pittsburg State star made the trek west to Pueblo, Colorado for the Dr. Dan Caprioglio Early Bird with one thing on his mind: Qualify for the national meet.

Strader has likely done that after taking home the victory in the 1500 meters, running 3:47 and receiving a conversion down to 3:42.55 – which is good enough for NCAA #4 on the D2 national leaderboard as of today.

He followed up that time with a personal best of 1:50 for 800 meters which is now good enough for NCAA #8 on the national leaderboard after conversion (1:50.05).

We know Strader is capable of running 3:43 as we saw him do that last outdoor season, but it’s nice to see him set a new personal best in the 800 meters. It was evident that he didn’t have the closing speed like some of his peers did at the indoor national meet and he's now working on it so that it will pay dividends later this season.

The runner-up from last year’s steeplechase has picked up right where he left off. While there is always some rust to knock off, Futter handled his first steeple of the year in fine form, finishing 8th at the Raleigh Relays while running 8:49.

That's one of the few races we’ll talk about this rankings update that didn’t feature a personal best, but that’s not something we are concerned about. Futter also ran the 1500 that same weekend running 3:51. We should expect to see Futter run a few more 1500s and steeples in the coming weeks and with those times, his stock could vastly improve.

He’s proven he can race on the big stage, but what we are really looking for moving forward this spring is his ability to run fast. It’s going to be another fast year in both of his primary events and we are still waiting for him to show us that he can run with the rest of the field in 2022.

Dannatt has seemingly flown under the radar and that's in large part to joining the Simon Fraser roster during the 2020 season when everything began to shut down.

Prior to this past weekend at the Stanford Invite, Dannatt had run 3:42 and 1:52 in the 1500 and 800 meters...well, according to TFRRS. That 3:42 mark didn’t come until May of 2021 while his 1:52 mark was run nearly a year ago to the date.

This past weekend, Dannatt ran 3:42 and 1:51 to set two new (attached) collegiate bests and find his way inside our top-10.

However, maybe more importantly, it's worth noting that Dannatt’s 1500 meter personal best is 3:39.76 which he ran in late June of 2021. If he returns to anywhere near that same form, then we could be talking about a title contender when the end of May rolls around.

For that reason, he cracks our top-10.

The close to Mitchem’s indoor season wasn’t an ideal one, but he is now back on the outdoor track where he can really thrive. In fact, he’s already made a statement by running 8:37 in the steeplechase at the Stanford Invitational which was good for 6th place and the NCAA #1 mark on the D2 national leaderboard this season.

That was also 19-seconds better than anything he had ever previously run in the event. That’s an absurd shaving of time in just the first few weeks of the season and it places Mitchem within the title contenders for this event.

We saw how strong Mitchem was when he ran 13:40 for 5000 meters during the indoor season and that has clearly carried over to now.

He will most likely have to go through Christian Noble if he wants to win a national NCAA title, but he’s clearly got the fitness to compete with nearly anyone in the country.

After holding his own, but admittedly not making a ton of national-caliber noise during the indoor season, Sharman-Newell literally brought the thunder to the Thunderbowl as he ran 1:47.16 at altitude a few weekends ago.

For context, that’s the NCAA #8 All-Time mark in Division Two and it’s the third-best time on Colorado soil. AND it converts down to 1:46.59! Wow.

All of that was on the heels of him running 3:48.57 for 1500 meters a week earlier. That time currently sits at the NCAA #6 spot on the national leaderboard after converting to 3:43.

Forget the altitude marks when it comes to Sharman-Newell’s 800 meters. We’ll call it as it is. This is someone who is probably the biggest threat to take home the 800 meter title outside of Wes Ferguson right now. To show that kind of strength/speed combo this early in the season should scare the rest of D2.

But it’s also worth asking...where was this during the indoor season?

Who says you have to get to the coast in order to run fast?

Ferguson didn’t leave the state of Nebraska this past weekend and opted to run the 800 meters against a quietly strong D2 field. That decision turned out to be a good one as he walked away with an outstanding new personal best of 1:47.80, outpacing a talented field by almost two seconds!

Ferguson also set an outright personal best by nearly 1.5 seconds and continues to put the NCAA on blast. As Ferguson continues to have his breakout year, it’s hard to imagine someone being able to knock him down a peg.

He’s brilliant tactically and if he’s this far ahead of multiple All-American contenders, then there’s no telling how far Ferguson can go. When he does inevitably does go to the coasts, we could see Ferguson dip into the 1:46 territory, and then we’re talking about one of the all-time bests in the event as just a sophomore.

Aaron Ahl is continuing his tear on the NCAA as the Simon Fraser team headed to Palo Alto for the Stanford Invitational. When Ahl left, he had run 3:43 (1500) and 1:51 (800), both good for provisional marks at the D2 level.

For Ahl, those weren’t his personal bests, but the times suggest that his finish to the indoor track season was a blip on the radar rather than a trend moving forward. He’s an elite middle-distance talent and he’s going to be a threat in the 1500 -- especially when you consider that he ran 3:38 for the distance (unattached) last summer -- and possibly the 5000 meters if he decides to move up.

We have never seen Ahl run a 5k as an attached collegiate with Simon Fraser and according to IAAF, the last time he did was in December of 2020. We’ll need to see it to believe it, but given his strength and elite speed at the end of a race, its certainly fathomable to see him pursue the 1500/5000 double later this spring.

Winders opened the season with a mere 13:58 (5k) fresh off of his two victories this indoor season. While that is a nice opener, it appears that some rust needed to be knocked off. It’s uncertain whether or not that time is going to get into the NCAA Outdoor Championships, but we can expect him to run faster than that if necessary.

Given his history, Winders should be better at the 10k than any other event this spring. After his giant statement at the NCAA Indoor Championships, we should expect to see him step up and run much faster than his 29:51 personal best in the event.

Until then, Winders stays inside the top-10 and if all things trend the same way as indoors, then expect a title contender in his respective events.

It was a ho-hum start to the outdoor season for Elson. His first time competing on the outdoor circuit within the NCAA, he toed the line at the AIC Yellowjacket Invitational where he earned an easy victory in a time of 1:51 for 800 meters.

There’s not much to break down here as 1:51 is obviously quick for someone who can run 8:02 for 3000 meters. That mark also makes sense given that he’s broken the 4:00 barrier this year. This was clearly a race that was designed to work on Elson’s speed in an effort to bolster his closing turnover for 1500 meters.

He’s the mile national champion and as far as he’s concerned, everyone else will have to go through him to win the 1500 meters this spring. Expect an opener in that event shortly where we’ll truly see how Elson stacks up against his competition.

Harding cracked the 28:30 barrier for 10,000 meters at the Raleigh Relays and in doing so, he put himself at the NCAA #9 All-Time (D2) spot for the distance (now currently NCAA #10 All-Time for D2).

That result now gives Harding the same label that he had last year: A realistic threat to take home the national title in the 10,000 meters.

The Grand Valley State star came up short of gold last season and will be looking to avenge that loss in 2022. Fresh off of an impressive indoor season, Harding didn’t wait long to run a 10k and he impressed with a mark of 28:25.

That was a 39-second personal best and while that number feels absurd, it doesn’t come as much surprise given the fitness that we saw Harding was in during the indoor season. While Harding does own an NCAA title from the 2021 outdoor season in the 5000 meters, the 10k might actually be his best race and we should see that this year.

Powell waited a week longer than his 10k counterparts to make his season debut after seeing Isaac Harding sneak inside the top-10 all-time in D2 for the event. After that, it was clear that Powell wanted his name in the record books as well.

At the Stanford Invitational, the Oredigger star finished inside the top-10 by running 28:22, good enough for NCAA #8 All-Time for 10,000 meters in Division Two. That top-10 finish also included some nice finishes over top D1 names like Thomas Pollard (Iowa State), Shea Foster (Oklahoma State) and Charlie Sweeney (currently Colorado, formerly Western Colorado).

It’s the first time we’ve seen Powell run a 10k at sea level, so it’s no surprise to see his personal drop by well over a minute and a half. We should expect to see another impressive performance from him at half the distance in the coming weeks.

The 10k, on paper, is Powell's ideal distance and for that reason, his stock in our outdoor rankings rises.

There’s not a whole lot to take away from Noble’s first two races of the season. He did, however, set a 10-second personal best in the 800 meters after running 1:50.72 the other weekend. What can't this guy do?

Noble lived up to tons of hype and then some the following weekend in Raleigh when he ran the NCAA #2 All-Time D2 5k mark by crossing the line in a personal best of 13:24.72. Not only did he run absurdly fast, but he also took home the victory over an outstanding field, further cementing why he’s one of the best to ever do it in D2.

It will take a monumental effort to move Noble away from this top spot. However, if we are already this sold on him during the outdoor season, imagine how we’ll feel when he runs what might be his best event, the steeplechase.

Ethan Lang (Fort Hays State)

James Dunne (Adams State)

Blake Jones (Illinois-Springfield)

Kale Adams (Adams State)

Cole Nash (Alaska Anchorage)

Ayrton Ledesma (Azusa Pacific)

Awet Beraki (Adams State)

Jared Gilley (Dallas Baptist)

Carson Bix (Lee (Tenn.))

Clement Duigou (Adams State)

Butare Rugenerwa (West Texas A&M)

Kyle Moran (Colorado Mines)

Dylan Ko (Colorado Mines)

Reece Smith (NW Missouri)

Ahmed Sado (Adams State)

Andrew O’Keefe (Adams State)

Clayton Sayen (Michigan Tech)

Connar Southard (Pittsburg State)

Isaac Prather (Concord)

Ryan Riddle (Missouri Southern)

Terrell Patterson (Southern Connecticut State)

Stephen Barker (Northwood (MI))

Mikah Paiz (Adams State)

Titus Lagat (Lee (Tenn.))

Dennis Mbuta (Grand Valley State)
 Scott Spaanstra (Grand Valley State)

Alec Hall (Adams State)

Luke Stuckey (Nebraska-Kearney)

Loic Scomparin (Colorado Mines)

Josh Pieratoni (Colorado Christian)