First Thoughts: GVSU Men Flex Depth, Western Colorado Debuts & Colorado Mines Women Impress

Alright, Division Two, now it's your turn for analysis!

The season is still very young and rust-busters are still plentiful. Even so, there were a few key results at the D2 level that we wanted to highlight and briefly chat about.

Let's dive in, shall we?

After earning a historically dominant national title victory last fall, the Grand Valley State men have lost numerous top-tier scorers, including three top-21 All-Americans.

And while we were confident that they still had an elite group of scorers via Tanner Chada, Andrew Hylen and Caleb Futter, we also had questions as to who would make up the second-half of this varsity lineup.

Well, after seeing Chada take home the individual win at the MSU Spartan Invite, taking down D3 megastar Alex Phillip in the process, we saw Hylen and redshirt freshman Koby Fraaza place 8th and 9th, respectively.

For Chada and Hylen, those results were somewhat expected.

But Fraaza? Well, even if we did think that he was due for a big race, I'm not sure we expected him to step into the team's third scoring role right off the bat, especially after a modest year on the track.

The still-young distance talent took down Milo Greder (12th), a Cincinnati runner and former Iowa State talent, as well as Nick Andrews (17th) from SUNY Geneseo, one of the NCAA's best runners in Division Three.

Those are some no-joke names.

It's still too early to properly gauge just how good Fraaza is/will be. Plus, we have yet to truly see how much upside some of these other young backend scorers have.

Even so, it was very encouraging to see him crack the top-10 of this meet.

As for the rest of this lineup, Brock Wooderson (15th) and Samuel Martens (16th) closed out the Lakers' scoring while a large handful of teammates were behind them.

Veteran Caleb Futter didn't have the best race ever, but there were so many GVSU men in the top-30 of this field that it makes you wonder if someone having an "off" day this season is really going to matter until the national meet.

In the end, the Lakers scored 45 points, nearly half of what the Cincinnati men scored. And while I still have numerous questions about the order and structure of this varsity lineup, it's encouraging to see so many underclassmen scattered throughout these results.

In theory, that youth-based depth gives Coach Jerry Baltes plenty of options and a scary amount of upside. However, the Michigan-based men will likely need more than just Fraaza to breakout this fall if they want to truly contend with Adams State and Colorado Mines.

Despite losing numerous top-tier talents from last year's squad and sitting at TSR #3, the Grand Valley State women were still expected to be somewhat competitive with the Michigan State women at the MSU Spartan Invite this past weekend.

The Michigan State women, after all, are theoretically in a rebuilding year after losing numerous top-tier scorers from their own 2021 lineup.

But unfortunately for the Lakers, they just didn't look super sharp.

Having veteran Natalie Graber place 4th overall was outstanding, but seeing Klaudia O'Malley fade to 14th place was a little bit of a surprise. Taryn Chapko (18th) likely had another five to eight spots in her, Kayce Rypma (30th) faded outside of the team scoring and Grace Pagone (51st) fell outside of the top-50.

We'll admit, that was not a great way for the Grand Valley State women to start their season. In our eyes, there were at least four women who could have been noticeably better this past weekend -- and yet, maybe that's why we should still be encouraged.

Because if this is the Lakers' floor, then their ceiling could be scary-good.

We should also note GVSU still had Madison Ebright place 21st and Shayna Altvater finish 30th. That was a nice display of scoring support for two runners who are still fairly young. We should also mention that former high school superstar and current GVSU freshman, Abby VanderKooi, finished 7th overall as an unattached runner.

We're not entirely sure what her status for this fall will be, but knowing that she could still step into this lineup later this season and act as a true low-stick is encouraging for GVSU's postseason aspirations.

The men's race at the Mountaineer-Cowboy Invite was essentially a dual meet between Western Colorado and Colorado Mesa, acting as an in-conference rust-buster before the season's truly competitive meets began.

Western Colorado's Simon Kelati was the overall winner of this race, taking down the Mesa duo of Ethans Abbs and Tony Torres who finished 2nd and 3rd, respectively. Behind those men was the Mountaineers' scoring contingent of Ryan Outler, Juan Diaz, William Johnson and Michael Grabowski who finished 4-5-6-7, respectively.

If I'm Western Colorado right now, I'm fairly excited about what I saw out of Kelati. He was pretty much a non-factor for this team last fall, but then found solid momentum on the indoor and outdoor ovals.

And while he still needs to refine his fitness even further, it's clear that he'll be a super valuable replacement this fall.

The Mountaineers lost All-American Cade Michael and middle-lineup scorer Riley Howard from last year's team. And while Outler and Grabowski are high-level talents, having Kelati step up and effectively replace one of those two men should keep this RMAC powerhouse comfortably in the top-10 of Division Two's best teams.

Am I saying that this lone rust-buster is immediately going to put Kelati in the All-American conversation? No, not necessarily, although I do think that Kelati has shown in prior seasons that he has All-American potential on the grass.

But let's put aside All-American aspirations for the moment. At the very least, Western Colorado likely has a scoring replacement in Kelati, and potentially another in Diaz. That's more good news than most teams ever get out of their rust-busting efforts.

On the women's side of the Mountaineer-Cowboy Invite, we saw Western Colorado essentially dominate Colorado Mesa as expected.

However, despite Colorado Mesa's Kira MacGill being listed as the winner in the overall results, and her being the on the cover of this article, it was Western Colorado's Katie Doucette who was actually going to be the winner of this race...until she missed the finish chute.

Despite that, it still seems fair to say that MacGill is becoming an increasingly more dangerous name at the Division Two level. After all, this is someone who ran 16:43 for 5000 meters this past spring. And during the 2021 cross country season, she placed 18th at the RMAC XC Championships and then 20th at the South Central Regional XC Championships.

MacGill is absolutely gaining momentum and she has proven that across multiple seasons. Seeing her take down an All-American talent in Allison Beasley, even if it was in a rust-buster setting, feels like an extension of avalanching fitness that she has built over the past year.

There are always a few breakout stars in the RMAC each and every year. And if MacGill hasn't already been considered a breakout name in prior seasons, then she will almost certainly earn that designation later this fall.

Coming into this 2022 cross country season, we were very high on the Colorado Mines women. They returned numerous high-level scorers from last fall, but more importantly, brought in some of the best program-altering transfers in the country.

Jenna Ramsey, for instance, was a true standout at Emporia State, running 16:41 for 5000 meters to place 10th at the indoor national meet back in March. She took home the win at the Roadrunners Invitational this past weekend while teammates Zoe Baker and Molly Maskin were 2nd and 3rd, respectively.

All three of those women ended up defeating a top-ranked talent in Madison Brown from Dallas Baptist, flexing a very scary amount of firepower that could be better than what Augustana or Grand Valley State assemble this fall.

However, the biggest question mark was (and maybe still is) how Clare Peters, the transfer from NC State's running club, would perform at the D2 level this fall. Owning a 5000 meter personal best of 16:49 coming into this season certainly caught our attention, but translating that result to the grass and to a higher level of competition isn't always a given.

And while a simple rust-buster, where she finished 5th overall, admittedly doesn't tell us much, it does tell us that Peters will likely be a competent part of this scoring lineup.

But her ceiling?

Well, that's likely something that we'll get a better gauge of when the Orediggers venture to D2 Pre-Nationals a month from now.