First Thoughts: Stanford Duo of Robinson & Hicks Go 1-2 in 10k, Ellis DQ'd & Anderson Misses Finals

We've got a whole lot to chat about. Let's waste no time and get into the analysis from the Wednesday night distance running madness, shall we?

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Men's 1500 Meters (Prelims)

I gotta be honest, these two 1500 meter preliminary heats gave us very few surprises.

In fact, both of these preliminary sections were largely chalk in terms of qualifiers for Friday's 1500 meter finals. And that, in-and-of-itself, is a surprising development! History suggests that there is always going to be one or two unexpected misses that we're not anticipating.

But that wasn't the case on Wednesday.

Just how predictable were these prelims? Well, out of our six writers who made top-eight All-American predictions for this race, four of those six writers didn't lose a single All-American candidate from their predictions. Personally, I only lost one name (Garrett MacQuiddy) while Maura only lost two names (Colin Sahlman and Cathal Doyle).

Sure, you could make the argument that Colin Sahlman was a surprise miss as far as the 1500 meter finals qualifiers go. But for as talented as this Northern Arizona rookie is, it's his youth and inexperience that simply got the best of him. I have a loose personal rule when making predictions that true freshmen, for the most part, cannot be trusted on the national stage.

That, of course, is not to say that Sahlman or any other standout rookies are "bad" or not talented. That would be a ridiculous suggestion. But in most cases, their understanding of tactics, their raw fitness and/or their ability to change gears is simply not on the same level as those who have been in the NCAA for three, four or five years.

And when it comes to Sahlman, it looks like the latter reason is what ultimately cost him a spot to Friday's 1500 meter finals.

Sure, maybe Michigan's Nick Foster not advancing was a surprise, but when you compare his resume to the 12 men who did move on to Friday's final round, I'm not sure you can be too upset. In reality, the best 12 men from this entire field largely moved on which, again, is super uncommon. There is almost always a surprise or two when it comes to these prelims.

However, what was unexpected was seeing how fast these prelims were!

11 out of the 12 men from the 1500 meter prelims ran 3:39!

No, not 3:39 or faster, I mean that 11 of those guys all ran 3:39 for the metric mile and were separated by 0.33 seconds! The last qualifier, Evan Dorenkamp, ran 3:40.34 in his 1500 meter heat, meaning that the entire top-12 were separated by a grand total of 0.84 seconds.

It's one thing for all of the top men to advance to the 1500 meter finals. But for all of them to qualify for Friday's final round with these kinds of margins is incredible.

I'm not going to lie, both Liam Murphy (Villanova) and Isaac Basten (Drake) gave me slight heart attacks with their last-minute kicks. Basten, especially, has a tendency to do that, but as I'm watching that second heat, I couldn't help but think, "There's no way that all of these top guys finish in the top-five. Surely someone's going to miss out!"

But nope. It went exactly as we predicted.

Men's 3k Steeplechase (Prelims)

Look, I really want to offer something of value when talking about these two preliminary races. I really do. But gosh, these two heats were just...well, kinda boring. There was largely no drama about who was going to get a top-five automatic qualifying spot in either heat.

And when you look at who advanced to Friday's final round and who didn't, you can't say that there were many surprises...but there were still a couple.

It's admittedly stunning to see Parker Stokes not make it out of the prelims. Sure, the Georgetown star was maybe not on the same level this spring that he was at last year, but he was certainly favored to make it past the prelims and even emerge as an All-American.

But the volatile nature of Stokes, which has been apparent since the winter months, reared it's head once more in Austin, Texas. And while he put together a valiant effort, it simply wasn't enough to move on.

We then come to Tom Seitzer, the Notre Dame ace who I have personally been very high on this spring. On paper, I loved everything about him. I felt like he had the perfect resume which featured ongoing progression, fast times, experience, great tactics, fairly strong race IQ, etc.

However, on Wednesday, he simply couldn't hang. And while this does throw a wrench in my All-American predictions, it is something that my fellow podcast co-host, Ben Weisel, warned me about. Because while he didn't doubt Seitzer's talent, Ben did have concerns about how the Fighting Irish veteran looked at the East Regional Championships.

But for the most part, it's hard to be too shocked about everyone else.

I do want to quickly talk about Victor Kipiego, the UTEP redshirt rookie who has looked incredible this spring. Yes, what I said about freshmen in my above 1500 meter analysis remains true, but Kipiego is distinctly different...and I was only talking about true freshmen, not redshirt freshmen.

This UTEP ace is getting significantly better with each passing week, and he's doing so at a rapid pace. While athletes as young or as inexperienced as him often lack tactical nuance, they also hold upside that can make them massive problems for even the most established veterans.

And knowing that Kipiego just ran 8:26 over the barriers two weeks ago makes me nervous about omitting him from my All-American predictions for this event...

Men's 800 Meters (Prelims)

Here's the problem with the men's 800 meters on the national stage: There are more finals-worthy men than there are actual spots to the finals.

Of the nine men who will be moving on to Friday's final round, I feel comfortable that all of nine of them had good-enough resumes to be on that stage. But I also felt like there were five or six additional men who could have advanced!

That, of course, is simply what happens in these prelims. Someone is going to go home early who you most certainly didn't expect. One of those men was Navasky Anderson, a guy who I believe is one of the most naturally talented half-milers in the entire NCAA.

The Mississippi State superstar, who has run 1:45 for 800 meters before, was caught in a tactical scenario. In the second heat, Anderson was left chasing Yusuf Bizimana (who was well clear of the field) and was then caught by a charging Mehdi Yanouri who was simply electric over the final 100 meters.

Anderson has proven that he is at his best when the pace is fast and when he can hammer the race from the front. That, however, wasn't what we saw in an 800 meter preliminary heat that was arguably the most tactical of the three sections.

And as a result, Anderson just didn't have enough late-race turnover, something that left him out of the finals in what one could ultimately consider to be an upset.

But just when things couldn't get more shocking, I saw this message via Slack from one of our fellow TSR contributors, Finn Birnie, "Sam Ellis DQ".

The Washington ace ran a near-perfect race in heat one, focusing on the second position and the entirety of the field rather than the top spot which comfortably went to Will Sumner (more on him in a moment).

However, when the entire 800 meter preliminary rounds ended, it was shown in the live results that the Washington star had been disqualified for taking two steps (or more) over his lane. And while it's not 100% clear from the replay when that exactly happened (potentially on the first curve during the start), the omission from the finals is a stunner.

But maybe the craziest part in all of this is that, according to Washington coach Andy Powell, Sam Ellis wasn't even disqualified for what the original protest stated. In fact, the original filer of the protest came from a school (Long Beach State) who didn't even have an athlete in Sam Ellis' 800 meter heat!

Ellis is one of the more tactically refined middle distance talents in the entire NCAA, specifically when looking at hybrid 800/1500 meter runners like himself. Not having him in Friday's final round is rather disappointing.

That said, if anyone was going to fill his spot, I'm glad that it's Abdullahi Hassan, the Wisconsin standout who has been very deserving of an All-American honor this spring. The Badger middle distance star been good in the past, maybe even great, but he has looked like a far more complete half-miler in 2023 than he ever has before.

Before we wrap up this section, I want to talk about Will Sumner, the Georgia rookie.

I know I use plenty of exaggerated language in my articles. I understand that I use words and terms like "jaw-dropping" or "insane" or "shocking" or "unbelievable" probably more than I should. But I sincerely don't remember the last time that I saw someone run 1:46.00 for 800 meters as easily and as comfortably as Will Sumner just did.

There is no denying that this Bulldog freshman has reached a different level this spring compared to the winter months. And yes, some of us at The Stride Report suggested that he could "possibly" be a contender for the national title.

Still, I don't think anyone expected him to look as good as he did on Wednesday night.

But it's not just that Sumner ran 1:46.00 for 800 meters and it's not just that he made it look like a rep in a workout. It's the fact that he found another gear, completely took over this field with a lap to go and then looked like that he still had ANOTHER gear remaining at the end.

AS A TRUE FRESHMEN.

19-year olds aren't supposed to do that. Guys as young and as inexperienced as Sumner shouldn't have that much control over their fitness. It just doesn't happen. It's not just rare, it's almost unheard of.

Don't get me wrong, I still think Yusuf Bizimana is the national title favorite in this event going into Friday, but gosh...I would not be surprised at all if Sumner took home gold and maybe, just maybe, scared the 1:45 barrier in the process.

Men's 10,000 Meters (Finals)

There is so much that we can analyze from this race, but let's try to break these results down as evenly and as efficiently as possible.

Gonzaga's James Mwaura went to the front of this race and chose to be the aggressor through the first mile or so. Historically, knowing Mwaura's race tendencies, that wasn't a surprise. This is a veteran who historically likes to run from the front and keep things honest.

Of course, regardless of how this race played out for him, that move was a risky one, but it also held a ton of upside.

In the Texas heat, an aggressive pace like that against an elite field could have very easily caused Mwaura to crash and burn. But on the other hand, this Gonzaga ace was also able to string out the field relatively early-on and establish an honest pace that was more conducive to his racing style.

And ultimately, that move paid off.

Mwaura didn't lead this race the entire way. In fact, he didn't even lead it for more than half of the time! Even so, he was able to put athletes in a position where they were pushing themselves likely earlier than they wanted to.

That, in turn, cut the contending field in half 20 minutes into the race and forced top contenders such as Dylan Jacobs, Bob Liking and Scott Beattie to fade out of the All-American conversation around the 6k mark.

When Mwaura ultimately settled back into the middle of the pack, he had enticed Oklahoma State's Isai Rodriguez to take over the pace. And that was ultimately who controlled this field throughout the rest of this 10k battle.

Arkansas' Patrick Kiprop consistently found himself in the top-three regardless of who was leading while the established trio of Casey Clinger, Ky Robinson and Charles Hicks stayed within striking distance.

I can appreciate that Isai Rodriguez wanted to keep things honest and do most of the work from the front. It's admirable. But as someone who settled for 5th place overall, five seconds behind the eventual winner, I can't help but wonder why this Cowboy veteran didn't wait longer to go to the front.

Because if Rodriguez was able to salvage a 5th place result after doing 70% of the work, then what could he have done if he decided to take over the lead with 4000 meters to go rather than 6000 meters to go?

It's far easier for me to sit at my laptop and say, "WeLl YoU sHoUlD hAvE dOnE tHiS." But between Mwaura, Patrick Kiprop, Victor Kiprop and a few others, I don't think this pace would have slowed dramatically if Rodriguez decided to be more patient.

Of course, to be very clear, I still thought that Rodriguez had, what might have been, the best race of his entire NCAA career. And yes, I'm saying that this performance might have even been better than when he finished 4th place at the 2018 cross country national meet.

But in the final moments of this race, it was Stanford's Ky Robinson inching up to the front of the pack and then unleashing a massive move with 400 meters to go. Soon after, fellow teammate Charles Hicks made his own move. And with 200 meters to go, it was clear that the race was going to be a 1-2 Stanford sweep.

The only question was, who was going to get the edge in the final 100 meters?

Despite Hicks looking like he had greater momentum coming off of the curve, it was Robinson who pulled away with one final gear, giving himself his first national title in a time of 28:10 while Hicks secured silver.

BYU's Casey Clinger put together another brilliant race to finish 3rd overall while Mwaura may have been one of the greatest benefactors of his own race plan, settling for 4th place.

Coming into Wednesday, it was clear that Dylan Jacobs was the clear-cut national title favorite in this event. He had, after all, been so dominant ever since the winter months. But in a scenario where Jacobs faded, which is exactly what happened last night, the national title conversation opened up to include a handful of other names.

Robinson winning a national title feels right given his resume, but if there was ever a time for him to win NCAA gold, I didn't think it would be this season. Don't get me wrong, the Aussie distance star had been plenty competitive this spring, but ever since the indoor national meet, this Cardinal star just didn't look quite as sharp as he has been over the last year.

Of course, in retrospect, it's fair to wonder...maybe he was just aiming to peak better than he ever has before.

As for everyone else, I only have a few quick notes that I wanted to make...

• Graham Blanks (6th) had a nice race. I wasn't convinced that the 10k was his best distance like a few of our TSR writers suggested, but I will happily be wrong about that if he's going to produce results like this.

• Barry Keane (7th) finally secured an All-American honor on the track. He made smart moves and didn't overexert himself when he didn't have to. He's been plenty deserving of this honor for the longest time and it's a great way for him to go out.

• Patrick Kiprop (8th) wasn't quite as patient as I would have liked him to be, responding to most front-running moves and staying at the very front of this pack for essentially the entire race. That said, this race did play out in his favor and it makes sense that he was able to salvage a top-eight result.

• Victor Kiprop (9th) is a tough name to analyze. The biggest knock on him was that he had not been able to deliver an All-American performance in the three national meet appearances that he had made prior to this past weekend (despite clearly being a top-tier name within the NCAA). And while a 9th place result deserves respect, it's hard to say that we saw his full potential on Wednesday. Of course, in fairness to this Alabama runner, he is still fairly young, only holding sophomore eligibility.