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TSR's 2022 Preseason D2 XC Top 25 Rankings: #25-21 (Men)
- John Cusick
- Jul 27, 2022
- 7 min read
Additional commentary and edits by Garrett Zatlin
25. Caleb Futter, Sophomore, Grand Valley State
At The Stride Report, we have harped on how much we value consistency.
And when we look at Caleb Futter’s resume, it’s hard to argue that he doesn’t fit the bill.
In his two years of running for Grand Valley State, Futter has already been part of five (!) national meets across all three seasons of competition and has earned four All-American honors in the process. The only time that he didn’t earn All-American honors was at the 2021 NCAA XC Championships when he finished 46th overall.
Before we get into the rest of our analysis on Futter, let us remind ourselves of how he ran on the grass last fall...
The GVSU ace debuted at the MSU Spartan Invitational where he finished 8th behind some names such as Morgan Beadlescomb, Isaac Harding, Tanner Chada and CarLee Stimpfel.
That’s pretty good company to be around at any point in your career -- whether it is on the grass or the track, it doesn’t matter.
Futter then finished a quiet 25th place at the Louisville XC Classic and didn’t factor into his team's scoring as he was the number six man in their lineup that day. Luckily, Futter would rebound in the postseason. He was 6th place at both the GLIAC XC Championships and at the Midwest Regional XC Championships while serving as a top-three scorer on the Lakers' roster.
However, despite his All-American hopes, Futter faltered to his aforementioned 46th place finish at the cross country national meet, leaving us at The Stride Report looking for more at the end of a fairly decent season.
Truthfully, Futter's 2021 cross country season was very up-and-down, but it had tons of positives as well. He had more than a couple of races that left us encouraged and it was clear that, in terms of his overall fitness, he was better than he had been previously.
And when you factor-in his success on the track, then this ranking becomes a bit more easier to understanding.
Futter holds personal bests of 4:04 (mile), 8:10 (3k), 14:24 (5k) and 8:44 (steeple). It’s safe to say that his 5000 meter time doesn’t hold up to the rest of his resume, but that’s exactly why Futter can be so dangerous this season.
If this Laker athlete takes any step forward this season in terms of his fitness, then it’s going to be incredibly hard to not move him ahead of other key names in our rankings. There are some giant holes to fill on this Grand Valley State roster and Futter has every tool necessary to step in and be an important low-stick for this team in 2022.
24. Andrew Amor, Junior, New Mexico Highlands
Andrew Amor's 2021 cross country season was nothing short of exceptional.
However, the same can’t necessarily be said about his very limited 2022 track season.
Last fall, Amor finished 4th at the Texas Tech Open, covering the four-mile course in a strong time of 19:53. That, of course, was not the most important part of his season.
After that race, Amor rattled off four-straight victories, including a victory at the Fort Hays State Tiger Open which included higher-end talents such as Robbie Schmidt, Luke Stuckey, Andrew O’Keefe and Myles Bach (to name a few).
That wave of momentum continued in the postseason as Amor ran his way to a stunning 5th place finish at the RMAC XC Championships and then proved it was no fluke by finishing 6th at the South Central Regional XC Championships two weeks later.
He later capped off his 2021 cross country season with a 30th place finish at the NCAA XC Championships.
Amor would skip the indoor track season before debuting in a 5000 meter race at the WT Spring Break Classic in a time of 14:40 which, admittedly, is nothing that moved the needle for us during the track season.
Then, at the Beach Invitational, Amor ran 29:56 for 10,000 meters. It was a decent result, but that was the last time we saw him in 2022.
It’s clear that Amor is very good on the grass, if not excellent, and there’s no reason to believe that he won’t be again. Still, we’re just missing a full year of results. We don't really have a great idea of where he's at right now and for someone who is already on the fringe of our rankings, that didn't exactly help his case.
Even so, we would understand an argument if someone wanted to rank him higher. Amor peaked in the postseason when it mattered the most and seemed thrive in competitive fields. As far as our rankings are concerned, he's done everything that we asked for last fall.
23. Noah Fisher, Junior, Findlay
The end of cross country was not one that this Findlay athlete would care to remember. Luckily, we are allowed to take into consideration more than just the NCAA XC Championships when constructing these rankings.
We all know how brutal the conditions were at the 2021 NCAA XC Championships last fall. Unfortunately, Fisher happened to be one of the victims who succumbed to a DNF result in that race...but that shouldn’t be what Fisher is remembered for.
Earlier that season, the Findlay ace finished 9th at the All-Ohio XC Championships before bursting onto the scene with his huge 5th place finish at the Royals XC Challenge.
Those highly impressive results propelled Fisher to a victory at the Great Midwest XC Championships and he continued his impressive racing at the Midwest Regional XC Championships, placing 8th behind a handful of eventual All-Americans from the aforementioned NCAA XC Championships.
Going into the national meet last fall, all signs pointed to Fisher being one of the better runners in the country. And while he didn't have a great showing at the NCAA XC Championships, Fisher did validate his talent on the outdoor oval.
This past spring, Fisher finished 15th at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the 10,000 meters. While that’s not quite the result he was looking for, that is certainly a good measuring stick as to where he stands up against the rest of the country.
That same season, he ran 29:19 for 10,000 meters and despite having only run 14:29 for 5000 meters, Fisher proved that he is aerobically fit enough to run nationally competitive times.
With another year of experience under his belt and a greater understanding that he belongs amongst some of the elite runners in D2, there’s no telling how good Fisher can be this fall. If things keep up at this race, then we could be talking about a top-10 runner by season's end.
22. Clement Duigou, Junior, Adams State
Clement Duigou wasn’t part of Adams State's 2021 cross country national meet lineup. But after confirming that the French native will indeed be back this fall, it would be hard for us to leave him out of our rankings.
Duigou raced twice during the 2021 cross country season which saw him finish 41st at the Mountaineer/Cowboy Invite and then 28th at the Fort Hays State Tiger Open. Both showings were, admittedly, sub-par results in comparison to what we have seen from him since then.
After the 2021 cross country season ended, it was a less-than-ideal start for the Adams State athlete who did not run anything of note...at least, not until the Husky Classic. Two weeks after that meet later, Duigou used a "last chance" meet to run a blistering time of 8:02 for 3000 meters. He’d later finish 5th at the indoor national meet running 8:00 while (surprisingly) defeating some of the nation’s best in the process.
But if that wasn’t enough to turn some heads, then what he did during the outdoor track season certainly was.
Duigou ran 3:51 for 1500 meters at the Maverick Invite before heading to the Mt. SAC Relays where he doubled up and ran 13:53 (5k) and then 8:36 (steeple). The Grizzly athlete would then cap his regular season on the track with a jaw-dropping steeple time of 8:29 at Payton Jordan, cementing himself among D2 lore.
Ultimately, Duigou would finish 2nd at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the steeplechase, but that runner-up performance shouldn't diminish the season that Duigou had.
I mean, heck, it was a silver medal at a national meet!
Duigou's rapid progression throughout the last six months has us convinced that he should see some kind of substantial leap on the grass later this fall. Athletes who are fit enough to run 8:29 in the steeplechase almost always contribute meaningful points on the grass.
If Duigou does fulfill that elite potential that he has flexed on the track, then he’s yet another high-octane low-stick who will impact the Grizzlies' team finish throughout the postseason. The problem, however, is trying to accurately rank him as we try to balance his track and cross country performances.
We don't know if this is where he'll finish the season, but until he actually toes the line, this seems like a fair spot for him.
21. Reece Smith, Rs. Sophomore, NW Missouri
We'll be brutally honest here, ranking Reece Smith was one of the hardest things we had to do in these preseason rankings. And that's not because we're skeptical about his fitness or anything like that (far from it)...but more because Smith has raced on the grass only twice in his college career.
No, not two seasons.
Two races.
One race came when he was at Iowa and the other came with Northwest Missouri during the 2020 COVID-stricken season.
There is simply very little data on what Smith can do on the grass at the collegiate level.
But at the high school level? Well, during his prep days, Smith finished no worse than 5th place while competing on the grass and he left his senior season with a title.
The Hawkeye-turned-Bearcat can, in theory, effectively compete in cross country and be more than just a participant. After all, he boasts personal bests of 4:08 (mile), 8:10 (3k), 13:57 (5000) and 8:33 (steeple). Smith was also recently crowned the NCAA champion in the steeplechase this past spring.
It’s not a matter of firepower for Smith when it comes to our rankings. He has all the ability in the world. If he a) toes the line healthy and b) effectively translates his success on the track to the grass, then there's thoughts that he could maybe flirt with a top-10 spot in our D2 XC Top 25.
On paper, we have every reason to believe that Smith can be a cross country star, but much like Duigou, trying to figure how far his stardom goes this fall is a challenge.
