John Cusick
Aug 2, 20228 min
Additional commentary and edits by Garrett Zatlin
No one burst onto the D2 scene quite like Ryan Hartman did last year.
On both the grass and the track, we saw this Augustana youngster quickly become one of the best runners in the country. And as we head into the 2022-2023 academic year, there’s no telling how good he may become.
Hartman opened up his 2021 cross country season with a 13-second victory at the Augustana Twilight Meet with an impressive mark of 19:21 over the course of four miles. A month later, Hartman finished 20th at the Chile Pepper XC Festival -- a very encouraging result to cap his highly promising regular season.
The Viking ace went on to take silver at the NSIC XC Championships, finishing behind teammate Austin Miller as the Augustana men took home the team title with a perfect score. At the Central Regional XC Championships, we saw Hartman finish 4th overall as he found himself only behind only Ryan Riddle (TSR #9), JP Rutledge (TSR #7) and Matthew Oglesby.
And then the national meet came.
The NCAA XC Championships is where Hartman arguably had the best race of his still super young career as he finished 22nd overall. Sure, he had a great season, but that All-American result truly validated Hartman as a national elite.
But with that result arose clear expectations that Hartman will be the next star low-stick for the Vikings over the next few years. Luckily, his efforts on the track only validated those suspicions.
This past spring, Hartman finished 8th in the steeplechase at the NCAA Outdoor Championships (earning All-American honors) and coupled that result with a 17th place finish in the 5000 meters. His marks of 4:04 (mile), 8:04 (3k), 13:59 (5k) and 8:44 (steeple) make him one of the highest value distance runners in D2 when you factor in his youth.
With his dangerous combination of strength and speed, Hartman should prove to be one of the scarier runners in the country this fall. The longer he sticks his nose into a race, the more dangerous he becomes.
And when you consider how incredible he was as a freshman, the idea that he'll make a massive leap in fitness as a sophomore isn't just possible, but probable.
As a second-year freshman, JP Rutledge was one of the best low-sticks in the country last fall...and he might not have been the best runner on his own team!
Rutledge never finished outside of the top-six at any meet he contested and you could make a case that he had the best national meet performance of anyone in these rankings (relative to expectations). Before the postseason began he finished 2nd at the SBU XC Invite and 2nd at the Missouri Southern Stampede behind only his teammate, Ryan Riddle.
Those are certainly not the most competitive meets, but that was a good start to Rutledge's young cross country career.
Rutledge proceeded to finish 6h at the UAH Chargers XC Invite where the competition wasn’t deep, but certainly top-heavy. After all, the athletes he finished behind have a combined 13 All-American honors between them which is a testament to the level that Rutledge competed at in the fall of 2021.
The Missouri Southern underclassman took home silver at the MIAA XC Championships and then another silver medal at the Central Regional XC Championships, making him someone to watch at the NCAA XC Championships.
And what we witnessed at the national meet was nothing short of amazing.
Rutledge finished 6th overall on the national stage, easily outperforming any other result we had seen from him prior. It was easily one of the most impressive runs of the day -- and it only helped him as he moved into his second year on the track.
On the oval, Rutledge set personal bests by eight seconds or more in each event he contested during the winter and spring track seasons (mile, 3k, 5k, 10k). That includes a 90-second improvement in the 10k.
Looking at his postseason results on the track, there wasn't too much more we could have asked for, all things considered. He finished the season in 14th place at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the 10k and now owns a 29:27 personal best at the distance, wrapping up a successful 2021-2022 racing season.
It’s clear that Rutledge is an aerobic monster. Even after seeing what he accomplished in his first year on the grass, we should still expect him to get better. He’s proven that he’s capable of racing with some of the best in the country and his level of consistency on the grass at such a young age cannot be stressed enough.
We’re expecting another leap in fitness for Rutledge with another year of training. And if that jump does come to fruition, then we’re talking about an elite low-stick who will make things incredibly interesting when November rolls around.
Ryan Riddle makes his way into our rankings at TSR #8 after an extremely impressive 2021-2022 campaign. And although he needs no introduction, we're going to give him one anyway.
Riddle had one of the most dominant cross country seasons in Division Two last year. The Missouri Southern star took home five (!) individual titles last fall, all of which were won by four seconds or more.
We’ll get to his postseason run in just a moment, but the UAH Chargers XC Invite is where Riddle really made a name for himself (on the grass) during the regular season.
En route to winning that race, Riddle held off current Ole Miss runner Shane Bracken, Joshua Chepkesir (TSR #6), Christian Noble, Mason Jones and JP Rutledge (TSR #9). Those are names who have consistently been in TSR’s rankings since Riddle debuted for the Lions back in 2018.
And it was that race alone that truly placed him within the elite category of Division Two -- and what he did afterwards only confirmed that.
A four-second victory at the MIAA XC Championships followed by a 15-second victory at the Central XC Championships speaks to the level of fitness that Riddle was showcasing that season.
That momentum later propelled him to a 20th place finish at the NCAA XC Championships. And despite that All-American honor being the best finish he has ever on the national stage, one could almost argue that it was Riddle's "worst" race all season long.
Riddle went on to run outstanding times of 7:58 (3k) and 13:53 (5k) while on the track and that’s an encouraging sign for the Missouri Southern veteran. After mainly being a miler throughout the first two years of his career, currently owning a 4:01 mile PR, it’s clear that whatever adjustments that he has made are seemingly working.
With his combination of race tactics, newfound strength and innate speed, there is absolutely no reason to believe Riddle will be worse in 2022 compared to his 2021 campaign. He has consistently run with some of the best men in the country and he doesn’t back down from any challenge (i.e. his 3k at the NCAA Indoor Championships).
Riddle will enter his fourth year at Missouri Southern with greater expectations than last year. And if he lives up to those lofty expectations in 2022, then both Riddle and the Lions will have made a huge impression within our rankings.
Coming into our TSR #7 spot is Isaiah Rodarte, a long-time Adams State veteran whose name you have probably seen numerous times before.
Rodarte finds himself ranked at this position because he didn’t have much of a track season. As a result, we are largely going off of performances that are nine months old.
In the fall of 2021, Rodarte found himself as the lead man for the Grizzlies for two out of the three postseason meets he competed in. After a faltering a bit at Paul Short, Rodarte was back to his normal self at the RMAC XC Championships where he finished 6th and was the top runner for Adams State.
Two weeks later, Rodarte found himself finishing 6th place once more, this time at the South Central Regional XC Championships and as the Grizzlies second scorer.
Regardless of where he was within his team, Rodarte had bounced back in the best possible way at the NCAA XC Championships...and boy did he shine when he got there.
In fact, he was so good at the national meet that he improved upon the finishes he had at the RMAC XC Championships and South Central XC Championships from earlier in the season.
Yep, that's right, Rodarte went on to secure a jaw-dropping 5th place finish on the national stage, making him the second-best returner from that meet in 2022.
That finish at the NCAA XC Championships is the best performance that we have ever seen from Rodarte. However, what we saw from him in his two prior meets was more of the “norm”.
In 2018, Rodarte was 5th at the RMAC XC Championships and would later finish 82nd at the NCAA XC Championships. In 2019, Rodarte found himself finishing 11th at the RMAC XC Championships before placing 9th at the South Central Regional XC Championships. He would end up 54th at the NCAA XC Championships that season.
Combine all of that with how he did in 2021 and you’ve got a case for one of the better, and most experienced, harriers in the country this fall.
We mentioned a recent lack of a track results on his resume and that's because Rodarte only raced three times before recording two DNF results to end his indoor track season. He then skipped the outdoor track season entirely.
There is no denying that Rodarte is one of the most dangerous and most experienced distance runners in the country.
While his availability and fluctuating performances are key aspects to watch this fall, it's hard to ignore a guy who is at his best whenever he toes the line for the most competitive conference meet in the country.
Being the second-best returner from the NCAA XC Championships doesn't hurt, either.
When making these rankings, there was some question about whether or not Joshua Chepkesir was going to be returning. He was, after all, one of the premier athletes on the grass in 2021 who had been in the NCAA for a long period of time.
After The Stride Report confirmed that he would indeed return, there was no question surrounding Chepkesir being in our rankings. And after some long conversations, we’ve placed him here, at TSR #6, in our D2 XC Top 25 rankings.
When you look at Chepkesir’s career on the grass, he’s a clear national title-contending athlete who looks the part and plays the part.
Dating back to 2018, Chepkesir has never finished worse than 17th in any cross country race. And if you omit one early-season result, then he’s never been outside of the top-eight.
In other words, it does not matter the level of competition that he's facing. Chepkesir's brilliant level of consistency is unprecedented and that’s what largely makes him worthy of this ranking.
Chepkesir finished 8th at the NCAA XC Championships in 2021, making it the second time he’s finished inside the top-10 at a cross country national meet – the other time coming in 2019 where he also finished 8th. He’s a three-time conference champion and was the two-time defending champion at the Southeast XC Regional Championships before finishing runner-up in 2021.
Like we said, his level of consistency is unreal.
We understand that Chepkesir's track times don’t necessarily jump off the page and that certainly can be seen as a (small) knock on him. Still, it seems fairly obvious that this long-time veteran is at his best on the grass rather than on the oval.
We should expect to see the same kind of racing from this UNC-Pembroke star in the fall. Another top-10 national meet finish feels like a no-brainer, but if he elevates his fitness to one level higher, then we could be talking about Chepkesir as a national title contender.