VERONA, WISCONSIN, September 27 — It wouldn’t be totally unreasonable to see the men’s Nuttycombe Invitational results as a possible harbinger of things to come 8 weeks hence in the NCAA for both team champ BYU and individual titlist Parker Wolfe of North Carolina.
Yet, those same results — with Ed Eyestone’s No. 2-ranked squad scoring a measly 48 points off a 4-6-8-9-17 finish to secure a 64-point edge over a very good No. 5-rated Iowa State team (108 points off a 5-19-22-29-33) — are waaaaaaaay too early to make prognostications, predictions or suppositions. BYU put on a clinic, just as Mountain Region rival Northern Arizona did last year in handily beating the Cougars, but Eyestone has been coaching long enough and successfully enough to know that the season is not defined by one race.
Ranked teams abounded here in a field somewhat smaller than usual with Pre-Nats looming in 3 weeks. Nonetheless, a number of teams served notice and far outran their rankings. No. 20 Wake Forest was 3rd with 150, No. 6 North Carolina 4th with 196, No. 27 Washington 5th with 246 and no. 26 Michigan 6th with 262.
In short, too many good teams are lurking and biding their time for the next two months. Absent from this 3-weeks-earlier-than-usual Nutty were top-rated defending champ Oklahoma State, No. 3 Arkansas, No. 4 NAU and four other top 10 units as well seven more ranked teams plus host Wisconsin, which will race in full force in mid-October. The Pre-Nationals field on October 19 (on this same Zimmer Championships Course layout) will not only be much larger but likely will further separate contenders and pretenders.
Certainly no pretender is the resilient Wolfe, who in his fall debut has seemingly picked up where he left off in Eugene with his NCAA 5000 win and his Trials 3rd. Wolfe finished here in 23:04.0. It’s the best time ever recorded over the 8K route that was revised in ’18. He’ll have his hands full here in November with, among a bunch of others, defending NCAA champ Graham Blanks of Harvard, who ended up taking Wolfe’s spot on the Olympic team by dint of having it the tough Paris Q-standard.
“I think more than anything, it was a good hard hit that I needed,” Wolfe said. “It definitely kicked my butt. So it was a good test. There wasn’t really a strategy but it was just kind of hang on, see what other moves are made and see where we can finish up.”
The North Carolina senior bided his time early in the 70-degree-plus temps and was content to run comfortably in the top dozen with teammate Ethan Strand, Wake Forest’s Rocky Hansen, Villanova’s Liam Murphy and the Casey Clinger-led BYU crew and a number of other eventual top placers. Frosh Robin Kwemoi Bera of Iowa State and Justine Kipkoech of Eastern Kentucky shared an early lead and by 5K Kwemoi Bera had built up a 6-second margin on the chase pack but never really broke his pursuers, leaving an opening which Wolfe eventually jumped on.
Wolfe was churning pretty well on the long uphill to the finish and looked as if he weren’t going to be denied the win in his fourth Nutty race. He had to churn, though, as Hansen (23:06.9), Murphy (23:08.6) and Clinger (23:10.4) were closing like gangbusters and trying their best to catch Wolfe. BYU’s 2-3-4 men also were rockin’ to the line with Joey Nokes 6th, Creed Thompson 8th, Aidan Troutner 9th and James Corrigan the Cougars’ fifth man in 17th. Kwemoi Bera faded a bit in the heat to a still quite creditable 5th after his early pace-setting.
“We were feeling it out for the first 5K and he [Kwemoi Bera] made it really, really hard,” said Wolfe. “There were a lot of points where I was, like, ‘I don’t know if I can go with this pace,’ and a lot of it’s instinctual, like I just happened to surge up. I think I’ve raced enough to know that I can get back on the guys I want to if I just keep pushing and today was like that. Just letting my body see where it takes me.”
Well, it took him to the top of the podium after seventh and sixth places as a soph and junior. Pretty good for Wolfe’s first race, and a result that he’ll gladly take for his last on November 23.
NUTTYCOMBE MEN’S RESULTS
Teams: 1. BYU 44; 2. Iowa State 108; 3. Wake Forest 150; 4. North Carolina 196; 5. Washington 246; 6. Michigan 262; 7. Eastern Kentucky 264; 8. Colorado 274; 9. Princeton 275; 10. Villanova 312.
Individuals (8K): 1. Parker Wolfe (NC) 23:04.0; 2. **Rocky Hansen (WF) 23:06.9; 3. Liam Murphy (Vill) 23:08.6; 4. Casey Clinger (BYU) 23:10.4; 5. ***Robin Kwemoi Bera’ (IaSt-Ken) 23:18.2; 6. Joey Nokes (BYU) 23:21.4; 7. Ethan Strand (NC) 23:25.4; 8. Creed Thompson (BYU) 23:28.4; 9. Aidan Troutner (BYU) 23:29.6; 10. Luke Tewalt (WF) 23:32.3;
11. Matt Strangio (Port) 23:35.2; 12. *Marco Langon (Vill) 23:39.0; 13. ***Justine Kipkoech’ (EnKy-Ken) 23:40.6; 14. *Max Sannes (AF) 23:43.4; 15. *Will Anthony’ (Va-NZ) 23:45.7; 16. *Kidus Misgina (FlSt) 23:45.9; 17. **James Corrigan (BYU) 23:48.8; 18. *Gary Martin (Va) 23:49.8; 19. Said Mechaal’ (IaSt-Spa) 23:53.5; 20. *Caleb Jarema (Mi) 23:54.2;
21. *Jacob Stanford (BYU) 23:54.7; 22. Silas Winders (IaSt) 23:57.7; 23. James Dunne (Gtn) 23:58.1; 24. *Colton Sands (NC) 23:58.3; 25. *Matt Rankin (Iona) 23:58.4; 26. *Myles Hogan (Prin) 23:58.6; 27. **Tyrone Gorze (Wa) 23:59.0; 28. Leo Daschbach (Wa) 23:59.2; 29. Gable Sieperda (IaSt) 23:59.7; 30. **Isaiah Givens (Co) 23:59.9;
31. **Charlie Sprott (WF) 24:00.2; 32. *Zach Ayers (AF) 24:00.3; 33. **Devan Kipyego (IaSt) 24:01.6; 34. *Assaf Harari’ (Syr-Isr) 24:02.3; 35. *Lucas Guerra (Gtn) 24:02.3; 36. **Aidan Ross (WF) 24:02.6; 37. *Matthew Neill (FlSt) 24:03.2; 38. Rob McManus (MtSt) 24:03.8; 39. Carson Williams (Furm) 24:06.1; 40. Jona Bodirsky’ (Port-Ger) 24:07.5;
41. **Luke Ondracek (Gtn) 24:07.8; 42. **Nathan Lopez (Mi) 24:08.9; 43. *Jackson Shorten (Prin) 24:09.4; 44. **Ryan Watts (IaSt) 24:09.5; 45. Nathan Green (Wa) 24:10.9; 46. Ben Perrin (MtSt) 24:11.6; 47. *Sam Lawler (Syr) 24:11.7; 48. *Tanner Lindahl (AF) 24:12.0; 49. *Tomas Vega (EnKy) 24:12.2; 50. ***Weston Brown (Prin) 24:12.7.
