What happened to Notre Dame Men?

religious hypo wrote:

God remembered he/she doesn’t care about cross country either

So original with that one. So hilarious and witty.

WillHarte wrote:

You don war paint for a race in Apalachee Park, named after the native people who once ruled much of Florida? Karma's a bit**.

That seems like exactly what you would to. If anything that’s honoring the warrior spirit. Personally I’m not into that, but it’s a cool idea.

iowakidscanrun wrote:

Only the occasional truly dominant teams have the strength to front run a 10k in this race and hang on. All the really good coaches understand this and preach patience.

This is the key. Notre Dame thought they could dominate this race. They could not, and they paid for it.

WillHarte wrote:

You don war paint for a race in Apalachee Park, named after the native people who once ruled much of Florida? Karma's a bit**.

Are you trying to be ironic? Or are you confused? Karma is Hindu. And the native Americans were called Indians. You know they are different people groups. Right? Different religions.

drop shot serve wrote:

WillHarte wrote:

You don war paint for a race in Apalachee Park, named after the native people who once ruled much of Florida? Karma's a bit**.

Are you trying to be ironic? Or are you confused? Karma is Hindu. And the native Americans were called Indians. You know they are different people groups. Right? Different religions.

Are you trying to be stupidest person on this website? You know that karma is talked about outside of Hinduism right? Show me where this person said that native Americans practice Hinduism because they’re “indians”, because you’re just putting words in their mouth

bluedot wrote:

If I was their coach seeing some of those shots where all the ND guys were visible yet only a few NAU guys had asserted themselves, I would have started yelling at them to slow down. And it sucks because they probably could have pulled it off today, but running those first two miles 10-30s too fast will haunt these guys for a long time.

Pulled what off? They would've gotten smoked no matter how fast or slow they ran the first 2 miles. This race wasn't decided on strategy, they were simply nowhere near as good as advertised

[quote]Surprise! wrote:

Pulled what off? They would've gotten smoked no matter how fast or slow they ran the first 2 miles. This race wasn't decided on strategy, they were simply nowhere near as good as .

[/quoute]

Andrew Alexander was 21 in 2020. he was 160 in 2021. Nuguse was 23/158. Mether 36/117. Have 2 of them in the 30s and they are fighting it out for 2nd.

why did they have such poor performances. I am guess it is the combo of slightly deeper fields, going out slightly too fast, and being a bit too tired from regionals.

You can give them credit for going for the win but it definitely backfired this time.

So, why did ND finish 9th in November when they finished 2nd in March? Many factors have been mentioned here (correctly), including went out too fast as a team, and because of the NCAA Indoor Championships two days before, the March line up was not nearly as strong as November’s.

A factor that has not been mentioned is Jake Renfree, who finished 22nd at Stillwater (as a freshman!), right with Dylan Jacobs. He made an enormous contribution to the ND score. But Renfree hasn’t been himself this season. He has raced, but not anywhere near his potential. What happened? Injured? Covid? He was not even chosen for the team in Tallahassee.

And what about running as a team? This is one of Coach Carlson’s mantras. But as we saw on Saturday, it only works when it works -- when everyone is running at a pace they can handle. In the ACCs and at Regionals that was true and ND was clearly impressive at (sorry Butler, “near”), the front. But at Nationals it’s a different ball game. My guess is that, at least in the ACCs, Dylan J and Danny K did not go all-out. They didn’t need to. And they brought the rest of their scorers with them.

Carlson knows his guys. He knows Alexander, Russo, and Methner (and probably Nuguse, even totally fit) can’t keep up with Jacobs and Kilrea at a 10K national championship pace.

If Carlson wanted them to run as a team, probably ND should have run two “groups.” One Jacobs, Kilrea and Carmody (finished only 10 seconds behind Kilrea in Tallahassee, following a great season), going flat out, balls to the wall, just behind the leaders. The other group, Methner (Methner this year – Methner next year should be ready to go with Jacobs, Kilrea and Carmody), Alexander, Russo and Nuguse pulling each other along as a team. Trying to put five or even seven runners near the lead was a killer for all of them. One indicator:

Nuguse dropped 146 places from the first split to 10K, and he did it steadily.

1.17K – 2K dropped 5 places

2K-3K dropped 4

3K-4K dropped 11

4K-5K dropped 8

5K-6K dropped 39 (ouch!)

6K-7K dropped 33 (double ouch!)

7K-8K dropped 18

8K-9K dropped 24

9K-10K dropped 4

That’s a sign of total fatigue. He went out too fast and couldn’t hold it. Make no mistake, Nuguse is a fighter (3:44.68 completely on his own in an ACC Championships heat), but if you are into oxygen debt at the 3K mark of a 10K national championship race, there is no way you are going to recover.

“A learning experience.” These are great runners and Carlson is a great coach. They will come back and continue to impress.

they should race more, but also they probably just aren't good enough. no shame in going for it on the biggest stage. no regrets. live by that ricky bobby motto.

good post above about running in two groups

This may be the smartest analysis on this site

What’s this war paint thing? Pics or shens please.

downfallalreadyhappening211 wrote:

Carlson got way too cute with things. Runners need to race to be ready to race.

Couldn’t agree with you more. He got cute and thought racing YN three times was a good idea. What’s the point of even coming back for a season if all your going to do if race three times? New rule, you have to race 5 times to be eligible for nationals. And cut the crap with Friday afternoon meets at 1 pm. It makes it very difficult to be a fan.

Horrible race plan. It works at ACCs and smaller meets but against the best in the nation at the course they were cooked the back half. Also Carlson took the not racing top guys all season to the extreme and it didn’t work.

LetsGetIt wrote: Horrible race plan. It works at ACCs and smaller meets but against the best in the nation at the course they were cooked the back half. Also Carlson took the not racing top guys all season to the extreme and it didn’t work.

“Run as a team.” For Notre Dame, this strategy fell apart last Saturday mostly because the differences in abilities among ND’s top five runners are too great (mirroring most cross country teams). At a National Championship pace, if you insist on running as a group of 5, 6 or even 7 runners, someone is going to be held back and/or someone is going to be deep in oxygen debt at 3K.

The strategy had worked before, at the 2020 Nationals, the 2021 ACCs and the 2021 Great Lakes Regionals.

In last year’s Nationals, the Irish #2, 3, 4 and 5 runners finished within one second of each other, scoring 87 points for second place, compared to #7 BYU’s 254 and #8 Iowa State’s 265.

In the 2021 ACCs, Champion Notre Dame placed all 7 runners in the top 16, and went 2, 4, 5, 10 and 11 for scoring, beating Syracuse by 52 points.

At Great Lakes Regionals this year, ND went 4-5-7-10-11 (and 12), with a margin of just 4.1 seconds between runners 1 and 5. And the Irish beat Wisconsin (11th at Nationals) by 50 points.

These results would be one more indication that running as a group does work when your team is stronger overall than the competition. At Regionals, ND did not need to panic when Butler’s Keane and Bedard were up by 22 seconds over the first Irish runner at 5K, because Notre Dame runners 1-5 were all running well, within one second of each other, and third place.

And that’s the way it stayed: At 7100 meters, the top six ND runners were within 0.6 seconds of each other. At 8150 meters the top five were split by 0.6 seconds. And at 9150 meters, the difference between #1 Dylan Jacobs and #5 Matthew Carmody was 0.5 seconds. In other words, no light between the five ND scorers. The team was running in a tight, disciplined and comfortable formation.

But the Nationals were a different story both because of the course – a slightly downhill first mile that took many of the runners (and anyone chasing them) out at a blistering pace – and the strength of the competition. Up against not a league or a region, but the best in the nation.

So, as I hinted in an earlier thread, possibly just a bit of refinement of the strategy for the moment, a bit more planning, a bit more (some would say) realism, might have put the Irish higher up in the finish table at Tallahassee. As it is, they did well. Just not as well as many of us had hoped.

I feel like they were out too fast but only because I know the results. Had they won, their tactics would look correct. It seems more like something went wrong in their preparations.

bingo wrote:

New rule, you have to race 5 times to be eligible for nationals.

this, and also hosting a high profile meet and then not racing it should be grounds for immediate disqualification

I feel like you may have a ton of skin in the game... Would love to know your connection to ND? Or do you always put way too much time into overanalyzing a very simplistic sport? They weren't prepared. They didn't race well and their coach let them down. They put faith in a coach that clearly got too cocky. If it ain't broke don't fix it. Could you analyze their 2019 schedule and see how many times they raced? Will say karma is a b**** for YN. Craigy was probably laughing his mullet off.

Sean Carlson reading his own press clippings trying to be Jerry Schumacher and not race.

Returning 6 All-Americans from last year and finishing 9th isn't good.

Now the question becomes, does Hoka pull super offer for him and Nguste going pro in a week?

Me thinks he stays put and continues to stockpile top recruiting classes.