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First Thoughts: Augustana (SD) Women Thrive at Roy Griak Invite, Northwest Missouri Men Flex Great Firepower
- Admin (Garrett Zatlin)
- Sep 23, 2024
- 8 min read
The Roy Griak Invitational did produce a few interesting headlines last Friday. However, we've only discussed the Division One teams and individuals who competed in the "Gold" sections. We have yet to talk about the "Maroon" races in Minnesota which featured a handful highly respected Division Two programs.
Below, we broke down the "Maroon" section results from the men's and women's races in an attempt to figure out what their performances could mean for the future.
Men's Maroon Race
1. Northwest Missouri Bearcats (36 points)
Gosh, how about the Northwest Missouri men? They were awfully impressive in the Maroon section at the Roy Griak Invitational on Friday. The Bearcats' top trio of Grant Bradley, Nate Mueller and Drew Atkins went 2-3-4, respectively, in the final results to give their team a formidable scoring trifecta that was ultimately too overwhelming for any other program to match.
For men like Mueller and Atkins, these results are highly impressive, but also not terribly surprising. The former was a fringe low-stick for this team last year (placing 70th at the NCAA XC Championships) while the latter ran 29:30 (10k) this past spring.
Bradley, however, is the biggest surprise. Yes, he did run 8:51 in the steeplechase this past spring to secure backend All-American honors. Even so, there wasn't much on his resume to say that he was going to have a performance like he just did on the grass.
Tyler Blay (11th) was the team's fourth scorer who offered sneaky-good value while Brandon Mundorf (16th) did an admirable job of closing out the team's top-five. Grayson Tapp (19th) was good scoring insurance as well.
It's hard not to be excited about the Bearcats. They just flexed an exciting trio of low-stick-caliber talents and their depth was subtly great in a larger field. Having a capable sixth man for scoring insurance was also nice to have.
2. Michigan Tech Huskies (91 points)
There wasn't a whole lot that the Michigan Tech men could have done to match the effort that Northwest Missouri put forth. Samuel Lange (8th) was a solid low-stick while Tucker Ringhand (12th) had what may have been one of the best races of his career.
The challenge, however, is that a gap formed between Michigan Tech's top-two and their three backend scorers Michael Dennis (23rd), Callen Carrier (25th) and Colman Lenci (27th). Thankfully, that same group of latter-half scorers (and Zebedee Swager who placed 30th) were all fairly compact and didn't let the team score get away from Michigan Tech.
For the most part, this seems like a high floor team that isn't ever going to have a truly poor outing. The bulk of their scoring lineup is very stable and they have a sixth man for insurance in case they need him. It is, however, still hard to say where in the national conversation Michigan Tech belongs, mainly because we still want to see Northwest Missouri line up against other top-tier programs.
3. Augustana (SD) Vikings (121 points)
An individual victory from Ryan Hartman was huge, although his effort didn't really tell us anything about him or this team that we didn't already know.
Unfortunately for the Vikings, Hartman was the team's only true lead scorer as Brady Hogan (15th) was next across the line for Augustana. Kadin Groen (28th) and Daniel Street (31st) were roughly as good as the backend contingent that we saw from Michigan Tech. However, the Vikings' fifth man dropped all the way to 56th place, forming a chasm-like gap of 30 points which ultimately allowed the Huskies to surpass the Vikings.
For the most part, Augustana isn't all too different than Michigan Tech this fall. If they are able to field a more complete and compact top-five at their next meet, then the Vikings could probably end up being just as good as the Huskies. Of course, that's easier said than done.
4. UW-Stevens Point Pointers (160 points)
The lone D3 program that we'll talk about in this article is UW-Stevens Point, a team that wasn't even listed as a "Just Missed" or "Honorable Mention" squad in our preseason rankings.
The Pointers did fade to a distant 4th place in this field, but having Logan Murphy (7th) run as well as he did was huge for this team. That's an excellent low-stick result for a D3 squad to have in a strong D2-centric field.
That unexpected boost in firepower was a welcomed result for the Pointers who had a somewhat large gap open up after Murphy. However, just like we mentioned with Michigan Tech, the backend of this scoring group was fairly compact and they limited excessive point inflation.
The combination of Mike Brown, Ryan Rininger, Aidan Schleutermann and Dean Montour went 35-36-42-51, respectively. And for a non-ranked D3 team that wasn't expected to be much of a factor in this D2 field, those are fairly strong results that this team could build momentum around over the next few months.
5. Central Missouri Mules (174 points)
Solid effort from a Central Missouri team that wasn't really on our radar at all.
Freshman Cosmas Kipop (6th) produced a huge low-stick result while Cooper Palmer (21st) and Luke Engel (33rd) offered a decent level of scoring stability. However, the Mules' final two scorers placed 67th and 70th, leaving them well behind the above four teams which proved to have far greater backend scoring.
Central Missouri has seemingly found their low-stick replacement for the now-departed Brian Mitei who is now at East Central. Not only that, but Bryan O'Barr didn't race last weekend! He was 17th at the Central Regional XC Championships last fall and could have cut out a heavy chunk of points if he had competed at top form this past Friday.
That should be an encouraging thought for the Mules as they attempt to reach the national stage later this fall.
Individual Race
Ryan Hartman looks as good as ever after securing a big win at the Roy Griak Invitational. He was favored to take home the win, but actually delivering on expectations is easier said than done.
Also, really nice race for Sioux Falls' Ben Morrison who took 5th place. He was 14th at this meet last year, but that was somewhat clearly his best result of the 2023 cross country season. He has seemingly taken a big step up in fitness and could be viewed as a potential All-American candidate if he's able to replicate this kind of result in the future.
Women's Maroon Race
1. Augustana (SD) Vikings (45 points)
We knew that the Augustana (SD) women were going to be the very heavy favorites to secure the overall win in the "Maroon" section during Friday's meet. And sure enough, the Vikings delivered an outstanding team effort that no other program in the field could have come close to matching.
The Augustana (SD) women were headlined by All-American Aubrey Surage last fall. However, on Friday, we saw the Vikings pack three other women into the top-11 of the results, giving their team a tremendous amount of firepower to pair with Surage.
Ella Bakken (3rd) was fantastic with one of her best-ever races while Eleni Lovgren (7th) had a massive breakout race in her own right. Surage (10th) had a slight "off" day (by the slimmest of margins), but still provided very strong scoring potency. Ashley Overgaauw (11th) further built on the steadiness that she showed last year.
With Taylor Melton (19th) closing out the team scoring relatively quickly, it was hard not to be impressed by Augustana (SD). And with four women in the top-11, we can't help but ask if the Vikings have finally been able to provide Surage with additional low-stick support?
It's admittedly hard to gauge how the Vikings' top-four will translate that firepower to a field which has stronger D2 competition, but it does seem fair that say that Augustana (SD) can realistically put themselves on the podium later this fall.
2. U-Mary Marauders (91 points)
Believe it or not, the firepower that we saw from U-Mary was just as good as Augustana through their first three scorers (in fact, U-Mary was better). That's because the combination of Alyssa Becker, Kristine Kalthoff and Andrijana Fundak went 1-4-12, respectively,
That result is huge for someone like Becker who we knew could be a top-tier low-stick star, but hadn't quite shown that since the fall of 2022. Kalthoff, meanwhile, was a very solid name last year, but had a massive race on Friday. As for Fundak, her result was largely in line with expectations given that she finished 76th at last year's national meet.
With veteran Elizabeth Acheson (18th) offering highly valuable support and stability to the latter-half of this lineup, the Marauders were not going down quietly. The challenge, however, is that their fifth runner faded all the way to 65th place which wasn't ideal.
Even so, if U-Mary is able to find a fifth runner to close the gap and eliminate excessive point scoring, then you could absolutely make the argument that they're a top-10 team in Division Two this fall.
3. Winona State Warriors (102 points)
It was exciting to see Sophia Taarud (9th) and McKenna Taylor (15th) step up as lead scorers for this team now that star-caliber names Lindsay Cunningham and Kaylee Beyer are gone. Violet Schulteis (22nd) and Ella Voit (23rd), both of whom are freshmen, did admirable jobs of ensuring that Winona State had a cohesive top-four scoring group.
I'll admit, the Warriors fared better than I thought they would despite losing two superstars from last year. Nearly everyone on this team stepped up in some significant way, outperforming expectations by a good margin.
Their final scoring spot did need to be better if the Warriors were going to take down a very top-heavy U-Mary team. Even so, Sam Harke (39th) and Madeline Palmer (41st) were still plenty serviceable when closing out the scoring. And given the youth on this team, there should still be room for improvements going forward.
4. Northwest Missouri Bearcats (116 points)
If you look at the lineup structure of Northwest Missouri, you'll find that it is very similar to what we saw from the Winona State women on Friday (except each scorer was just a few spots back from where the Warriors placed).
Lydia McGlocklin (13th) and Alyna Thibault (15th) weren't exactly potent low-sticks, but they were still respectable lead scorers. Mayson Hartley (27th) and Reagan McGuire (28th) mostly stabilized the lineup while Breelie Mauro (38th) acted as a decent enough close out scorer to cap off the day for the Bearcats.
Everything that we said about Winona State can be said about Northwest Missouri. They have a somewhat balanced lineup, but there isn't necessarily one characteristic of this team that stands out in any dramatic way. They do, however, have tons of underclassmen which should (in theory) give them more upside than the 3rd place team who beat them on Friday.
5. Minnesota State Mavericks (187 points)
Based on the scoring and lineup structures of the top-four teams in this field, Minnesota State was simply not in that tier. They did, however, put together a strong enough lineup to emerge with a 5th place finish. Yes, there were significant gaps in the Mavericks' scoring group, but they were also fairly balanced as well.
Madison Matzek (14th) offered strong scoring value while Alexi MacDonald (34th), Emily Cunningham (44th) and Makayla Bishop (49th) did enough to get by. Their fifth runner did drop to 66th place, but for the most part, this team was roughly on par with expectations and they held their own in a field that could have been overwhelming.
Individual Race
We are big fans of Alyssa Becker when she's fully healthy and firing on all cylinders. That is seemingly the version of Becker that we got on Friday as she snagged the win from a former D2 superstar (and unattached runner), Kaylee Beyer, by 10 seconds.
That was a massive win and it was earned convincingly. We knew that Becker had a ton of raw talent and plenty of upside, but somewhat easily defeating someone like Beyer should not be ignored. At the very least, that kind of result suggests that Becker can be a top-10 name in the country come November.
