The Group Chat: Detailing the NCAA D2 Championships

The NCAA D2 National Championships have now concluded and my goodness is there a lot to talk about. Below, our D2 crew answered a few prompts for the meet to keep our readers content until the next (and final) round of rankings are released.

Let's just right into it...

The 10,000 meters were two entirely different races this weekend. On the men’s side, Ezra Mutai pulled out a tight win over the likes of Isaac Harding. Meanwhile, Ida Narbuvoll hammered the field during the second-half of her race. Are you at all surprised by the tactics of each runner?

Eric: Ezra Mutai winning at the line didn’t surprise me while Ida Narbuvoll’s strategy shocked not just me and the field, but everyone in the stadium (except the U-Mary coaching staff).

Isaac Harding is a really fierce competitor, so I’m not surprised that he took Mutai to the line to finish 2nd plcae for the third time this year. With Mutai, he’s exceptionally talented, so he just had to make sure he was in a good position with 400 meters to go. I think he was confident in his race strategy, so for him to win at the line didn’t shock me one bit.

Now, Ida Narbuvoll’s strategy to hammer from the gun and be able to hold the pace -- or at the very least not get caught by any of the other competitors -- made a statement in my eyes. She wasn’t here to go through the motions. It was amazing to watch as it really felt as though both races she ran were glorified time trials at a national meet. Just wow.

Nate: The best way to put it is that I thought these races would be flipped. I figured Mutai would put the hammer down a little further out if not push it early on, rather than letting people close and then putting it to rest of the field over the last 800 meters. I don’t think Mutai could have gone wrong with his tactics. If anything, I think that waiting as long as he did shows tremendous confidence in his abilities. Mutai took a great approach and executed it to perfection.

As for Narbuvoll, she completely shattered any thoughts I had prior to this race in stunning fashion. She just kept rolling and threw down the hammer with 4k to go and it was awesome.

John: I hadn’t ever seen a race run the way like Mutai ran his 10k this past weekend. He clearly wanted someone else to take the lead at times during the windy race and no one wanted to do the extra work. While it almost backfired, Mutai was able to do two things.

The first thing was that he came away with the victory by one one-hundredths of a second. The second was that he caused absolute mayhem for the rest of the field. It became a three-man race after the first 5k before Dylan Ko and Tanner Chada made their way back. I definitely thought we would see Mutai hammer away at a steady pace to try and break the field, but he did it in a much more chaotic manner to achieve the same result.

As for Narbuvoll, the idea that she closed her last 5k faster than most of the 5k national qualifiers had even run this season is absurd. It was probably the best strategy of the weekend as none of her competitors thought she would be in that kind of shape halfway through the 10k.

I’m not surprised that this is the strategy that Narbuvoll used, but I didn’t anticipate her doing it in a year where it seemed there was enough competition to make that strategy somewhat questionable. She put all of that questioning to rest this weekend and even if it was the best strategy, it wasn’t even her best race.

The steeplechase were both races for 2nd place. Taylor Stack replicated his RMAC performance running away from the field while Eilish Flanagan made it a clean sweep for the high altitude programs. Outside of the two winners, whose performances surprised you the most?

Eric: On the women’s side, I have to go with Lock Haven’s Laurel Moyer. She had always played second fiddle to Edinboro’s Stefanie Parson in the PSAC, so this was a nice opportunity to really show that she’s one of the top steeplechasers in the nation. I didn’t even pick her to finish as an All-American, that’s how surprising it was for me personally. Even so, I should’ve known better as she had been running very well since she made the transition from cross county to track in late March.

For the men, Jake Mitchem taking 3rd place stood out to me. Personally, I had him finishing as an All-American, but not competing for a podium spot. He was only a second from Grand Valley State’s Caleb Futter for runner-up and just beat out Malone’s Noah Schaub for bronze. He closed hard and was able to move up two spots in the final lap alone. He had the second-fastest closing lap and if Futter wasn’t so strong at the end, he probably would’ve got him as he was just 0.25 behind.

Nate: I have to start by giving credit to Sarah Wills. The Adams State senior wasn’t in my All-American picks and I couldn’t have been further off the mark. Evidently, Wills had begun peaking at just the right time as she hit a seasonal best at the Lee University Last Chance meet by over 20 seconds. Wills topped that with a PR and All-American finish this past weekend, leaving me to ask how I overlooked her.

On the men’s side, I have to go with another Grizzly in Ahmed Sado. I know Sado isn’t a true freshman, but regardless, this is only his first year of competing for Adams State. I also know that this isn’t his first national meet. This past winter season, we witnessed him work and excel at the mile distance.

Obviously, by virtue of making it to this meet Sado’s proven himself, but I had him barely squeaking out an All-American finish. Longer distances and barriers make the steeple a completely different animal. That, however, didn't bother Sado who comfortably earned that first-team All-American nod and was within seconds of stealing a podium spot, so I am both surprised and very impressed.

John: I was extremely impressed with Jenna Keiser from Saginaw Valley State. She snagged the last All-American spot, finishing 8th in a time of 10:35. After a sub-par indoor season, the junior peaked at the perfect time and found herself in arguably the best race of her career. With 800 meters to go she was dead-even with Augustana’s Rebekah Rairdon before putting together an 85-second lap followed by an 82-second lap to put eight seconds between her and Rairdon by the time she crossed the finish line.

On the men’s side, I was impressed with Malone’s Noah Schaub. Much like the aforementioned Keiser, Schaub peaked at the perfect time. Setting a personal best the weekend before in the steeple (8:50), he came back this weekend and ran 8:55.19 which was good enough for 4th place. It was nearly good enough for 3rd place as he finished with the same exact time as Jake Mitchem did.

James Young and Stephanie Cotter defended their titles from the indoor season in familiar fashion. Young won in near wire-to-wire fashion while Cotter ran the sixth-fastest time in D2 history (4:14) with her effort. Whose performance was more impressive?

Eric: James Young won at the line, continued his winning streak for the mile/1500 at national meets and ran 3:37 earlier in the year. He flashed his talent throughout the year whereas Cotter ran the 1500 three times before NCAA's and didn’t really run up to her potential until this past weekend.

With that being said, she always shows up at the national meet, so for her to win didn’t surprise me. However, what did surprise me was seeing her run 4:14 en route to a five-second personal best and setting a new facility record. That was ultimately what made this the most impressive performance in my mind.

Nate: I have to roll with Stephanie Cotter’s performance in this case, plain and simple. A national title is impressive, there’s no doubt about that. But judging these performances head-to-head, Cotter’s race was simply more impressive. Cotter ran the fastest she ever has after a spring season where no one really saw too much of her on the outdoor oval. And the little bit of racing Cotter did have this season wasn’t anything super mind-blowing. So for her to come onto the biggest stage, survive and advance, then win from gun-to-tape? That’s pretty good.

Young also didn’t really help himself in this case as we’ve seen him run much faster earlier on.

John: This is a tough one for me to pick. If you’re asking for the best overall performance, you would go with Cotter. If you want the most impressive, I’d have to go with Young here. The sixth-fastest time by Cotter is very impressive, but the men’s race closed in 1:53 and Young took home the victory with a near wire-to-wire win. It’s really hard to lead a race for the entirety of it, let alone come home in 1:53. It was nearly all for not as he only won by one one-hundredths of a second, but that doesn’t matter as a win is a win no matter how close it is.

Both the men’s and women’s 800 were close battles. Butare Rugenrewa edged out Dennis Mbuta by one one-hundredth of a second. Meanwhile, Bailey Sharon held off RMAC rival Yasmine Hernandez to take home her second career NCAA title. What do you think the field could have done differently to change the results?

Eric: Here’s the obvious statement with the 800: If you want to win, you have to close hard. Both Bailey Sharon of Western Colorado and Butare Rugenerwa of West Texas A&M had the fastest second lap, thus taking the title. Sharon closed in a 62 and Rugenerwa ran a second 400 split in 52. Luckily for Rugenerwa, he leaned at just the right time. If he didn't, we would be talking about Grand Valley State’s Dennis Mbuta.

Nate: In the case of the men’s 800, I think the only plan to change the result is taking it out a little harder the first 400 meters. The top of the field managed to close really hard, notching a big negative split. Like Eric said, that’s what determines the victor at this distance. There’s no hiding in the 800 meters, especially in the homestretch. With that being said, the way to shake people in an 800 would be to make it brutally honest. And the way to do that is to go out hard the first lap. That’s the one thing anyone in this field could have done.

For the women’s 800 meters, the case is the opposite. They went out at a fairly honest pace. If anything, the progression of the women’s race was almost ideal looking at just the splits. That’s why if we’re talking about changing the results for the women’s race, then the approach would be making it more of a tactical affair.

While that may not have changed the top-two spots, it would definitely have allowed for a shake-up in the other finishing positions and maybe even between Sharon and Hernandez.

John: I think on the men’s side of things, they needed to go out harder if someone else other than Rugenerwa were to win. The favorite in Dennis Mbuta hung out and they jogged the first lap in 58 seconds. I think it needed to have gone out in 50 to 52 seconds for that first lap if they wanted to try and take the wheels away from everyone else. Obviously there’s the possibility of taking the lead and blowing up, but everyone was left in the race for the final 100 meter kick and what ensued was Rugenerewa out-leaning Mbuta while crashing to the ground immediately after.

On the women’s side, I don’t think they could have done anything differently. After losing to Bailey Sharon in the 400 meters at the RMAC Championships a month earlier, Yasmine Hernandez likely knew her best chance to beat her was to try and take her legs out from underneath her. She opened the race in 29 seconds and appeared to have done just enough to get the best of Sharon. Obviously, that wasn’t the case as Sharon ran even splits of 62 to catch Hernandez and earn her second NCAA title.

In the 5000 meters, Ida Narbuvoll claimed her second title of the weekend with a gutsy race plan while Isaac Harding finally broke through and won his first NCAA title after out-kicking Carson Bix. Both athletes doubled back from the 10,000 and obviously had great success. Was this something we should have anticipated?

Eric: For Ida Narvuvoll, this season just simply meant more as she completed an undefeated season by sweeping both the 5k and 10k at the national meet. You could see it from how she lined up to how she went immediately to the front in both races that she was in the zone.

Aside from her coaching staff, I don’t think anyone could’ve expected these types of performances. The other coaches in the NCAA and my co-writers at TSR obviously talked plenty about this girl from U-Mary since she hadn’t lost yet this season, but nobody was expecting this type of dominance from her.

When somebody finishes 2nd place at the rate that Harding was, you have to start to question if he’s going to be a perennial runner-up finisher or if he can actually win one. That’s why it was nice to finally see him grab a gold medal, especially on his home track.

Coming back from the 10k is very tough, especially when you're competing against the best competition in D2, but Harding is a real gamer. If he was lining up, he was going to give it his all. For the most part, most of the Lakers who doubled, whether it was on the men’s or women’s side, had solid races all around, which really highlights the development and training from Grand Valley State's coaching staff.

Nate: In the case of Isaac Harding, this was something I think should have been anticipated. Harding has shown us he can run fast times and race well when scoring is on the line. We had already seen him throw down at the national meet during indoors, so it was apparent that he wasn't going to back down in the face of a challenge. The outdoor oval may be a little different, along with the distances that are offered, but that doesn’t mean much to proven competitors like Harding.

As for Ida Narbuvoll, like Eric said, she had done nothing but win all season. But the way that she won on this stage against the field that she had to compete with? I don’t think anyone outside of Narbuvoll’s circle can claim they anticipated it.

That's why it's wild to think that Narbuvoll wasn’t a heavy favorite to win either event. The fields were loaded, after all. So to anticipate the show that Narbuvoll put on this weekend before it happened would have been unreal. Her performance was just that good.

John: Narbuvoll’s 5k race plan was not something that I expected. And based on the rest of the field, no one else expected it either. She opened with a 70-second lap! She had a seven-second lead after the first mile and she never looked back. She faded a smidge before closing with a sub-70 final quarter.

It was apparent that this was Narbuvoll’s race from the gun and despite the Flanagan sisters trying to reel her back in, there was never any question about who would be taking home the title. I really expected the Flanagan sisters to do what Narbuvoll did and it was surprising to see the tables turned on them 200 meters into the race.

I think it’s fitting that Harding finally was able to capture his long-awaited NCAA title. While watching, I thought that he was going to finish 2nd place for the fourth-straight time and I couldn’t imagine the agony that would come along with it. His final kick to outlast Carson Bix was clearly something more than fitness. That was sheer will power to finish the job and he was rewarded nicely for his effort.

Harding proved all season that he was one of the best distance runners in the country and all he was missing from his resume was the NCAA title. Now that he’s got one, the Laker athlete accomplished what he was looking for when he made the move from Ann Arbor to Allendale this past summer.