I think guelph would make nats on a regular basis in the NCAA. This team of runners could very well be top 15 this year (all aside assuming they field their best without special consideration) all their athletes are eligible in the CIS and not pushing ridiculous age limits, and are probably just scraping by based on the funding they do get from the province/school (which is limited and sure does not affect all their athletes equally, but that's a whole thread on it's own) I do not think that track times correlate so strongly to cross, but that's just my opinion.
top ten is a huge accomplishment for a school (how many d1 schools are there?). I think after seeing the strength of the duck's team, and results from stanford a few years ago when stanford placed all their scorers ahead of guelph's #1, that the powerhouse teams of the NCAA would really stack up and punish guelph, especially for their lack of depth in the NCAA system.
I think that were these athletes attending a U of Guelph in an NCAA system, that they would likely still all be eligible in the same year in a similar range of fitness, or that other athletes who have come through the system would be there picking up the slack. ( a brunsting who would beat a boorsma instead of a genest, like last year). This team has been awesome in the CIS, and has obviously turned some heads in the NCAA to be worthy of this thread, and the discussion it stimulated.
The Gryphon teams have been working their way onto the radar for a long time, with annual trips to the us for meets from north carolina, to penn state, regular trips to boston, and bethlam etc. they go where they can get the competition, and that has been found in the NCAA. The reason they are being noticed is because they have succeeded in competing well!
In similar comparison of apples to apples, i bet the best of the D2 schools would rock a lot of good/decent D1 teams. I know that guelph can compete with the D2 in a very competitive level. Good luck to UBC/Simon Frasier who are actually in the US system and playing by the thick and weighty NCAA rulebook.
Can this team crack the top ten? I would expect canadians to play this team up and americans to play this team down. Where does the truth lie? Somewhere in between. I have a lot of faith in DST, and think that come the time for the big show, that this team would have a shot. It's never guaranteed, you won't know till you run the race, but then again, that's why we run the races.
Bang on Gryphons, Bang on!