Hopkins's Seth Eliason is the state's top rated runner by CCRS, by a fairly clear margin. He has but a lone loss against Minnesota competition this season, to Maple Grove's Alex Miley at the season opening St. Olaf High School Showcase. Since then, he has been undefeated against many of the state's top runners. Each of these times though, he has won by only the slightest of margins - five of his six wins have come by a single second or less. Only his victory at Lucky Lindy (his lowest rated performance of the year) came with any breathing room. Each of his highly ranked Lake Conference foes - Patrick Roos, Khalid Hussein, and Matt Wilkinson - have had at least one chance at outsprinting Eliason this season, but each have been unsuccessful. Eliason is an accomplished 800m runner with demonstrable closing speed, and his race plan likely revolves first and foremost around simply being present for the finishing kick.
Who is most likely to challenge him? According to the coaches poll and the early season match-up, its Miley. This is a heavy point of contention for CCRS. The computer rates Miley's performances throughout the season as a shade slower than those produced by Eliason, usually by a difference of 1-2%. Several things are worth noting:
* Opening week meets are not included in individual CCRS ratings, due to an inherent lack of precision at the beginning of the season.
* St. Olaf, if included, would represent Miley's best race of the season and Eliason's second worst (behind only the aforementioned solo effort at Lucky Lindy)
* Since St. Olaf, Miley has won each meet he has entered by a comfortable margin and may theoretically have more in the tank, so to speak, than what he has actually shown
Since Miley has actually defeated Eliason, its probably an intuitively ridiculous proposition to suggest he only has a 1.2% chance to do so again (while defeating everyone else, of course). He absolutely has not produced the performances Eliason has since then, but a Miley supporter would be justified in pointing out the lack of competition he has faced in those races. However, Miley's performances have been remarkably consistent (more so than any other top-ranked runner), suggesting something at least close to a maximal effort. Miley's ultimate performance may serve as a sort of evidence for or against the validity of CCRS projections - Either he replicates his section and conference performances and settles for a top-5, or he finds an extra gear that CCRS never accounted for on his way to victory.
The other major challengers - Roos, Hussein, and Wilkinson - have, as mentioned, all taken shots at Eliason and failed. Each have been consistently fast and occasionally very close to victory, and all should certainly factor into the race in a major way on Saturday. Hussein may be the best bet of the group, having been outleaned by Eliason on three occasions, including at last week's Section 6 meet.
One other challenger worth mentioning is Innocent Murwanashyaka of Como Park. His situation is similar to that of Miley's - weeks worth of solo victories make it difficult to assess his true highest potential. Unlike Miley, he has not once raced somebody projected to finish in the top 10 on Saturday. He has also been fairly consistent in his performances, albeit another shade below Miley. He will certainly be hoping to contend for the victory and, while CCRS views his performances thus far as insufficient proof of this possibility, he may well have another gear in reserve as well.
Projections below represent the results of 1000 simulations of the 25 projected all-state athletes. While the overall projections are based only on sections and conference meets, the simulations below included all recorded meets for the individuals listed. For these reason, their may be slight discrepancies between an athletes projected finish in the overall list and his outcomes rated below. The average standard deviation for all athletes this season has been about 1%, suggesting that about 25 athletes have a reasonable chance at the top 10 and at least 60-65 have a reasonable chance at an all-state finish.
| Seth Eliason | Patrick Roos | Khalid Hussein | Matt Wilkinson | Alex Miley | Innocent Murwanashyaka | Liban Jama | Grant Price | |
| 1 | 51.40% | 13.30% | 27.10% | 7.00% | 1.20% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 2 | 29.30% | 25.10% | 25.10% | 18.70% | 1.50% | 0.30% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 3 | 12.70% | 33.00% | 21.90% | 23.50% | 6.40% | 2.30% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 4 | 5.30% | 19.50% | 14.80% | 28.30% | 22.90% | 7.90% | 0.00% | 0.30% |
| 5 | 1.30% | 6.20% | 6.80% | 14.70% | 42.30% | 20.90% | 0.40% | 1.60% |
| 6 | 0.00% | 2.50% | 2.60% | 6.40% | 20.60% | 40.50% | 4.90% | 6.10% |
| 7 | 0.00% | 0.40% | 1.20% | 0.80% | 4.00% | 16.00% | 14.80% | 15.50% |
| 8 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.30% | 0.30% | 1.00% | 5.70% | 18.20% | 15.50% |
| 9 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 3.30% | 19.00% | 12.10% |
| 10 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 1.50% | 14.80% | 9.00% |
| 11-15 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 1.60% | 26.40% | 31.20% |
| 16-20 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 1.40% | 8.20% |
| 21+ | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.50% |
| Jeremy Gilbertson | Joseph Minor | Reed Kurak | Grant Matthews | Gemechu Meskele | Owen Smalley | Colin Dwyer | Blake Buysse | |
| 1 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 2 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 3 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.20% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 4 | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.30% | 0.00% | 0.50% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 5 | 0.30% | 0.20% | 3.60% | 0.10% | 1.20% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 6 | 1.20% | 1.10% | 7.70% | 0.20% | 2.30% | 0.60% | 0.90% | 0.20% |
| 7 | 7.30% | 2.90% | 17.70% | 2.60% | 5.30% | 1.30% | 2.60% | 1.70% |
| 8 | 12.10% | 4.50% | 12.90% | 4.80% | 3.80% | 1.20% | 5.70% | 3.10% |
| 9 | 13.70% | 4.70% | 11.80% | 4.60% | 4.40% | 1.60% | 7.00% | 7.00% |
| 10 | 15.10% | 6.00% | 9.00% | 7.40% | 5.00% | 0.90% | 7.70% | 6.20% |
| 11-15 | 43.70% | 36.60% | 27.20% | 49.20% | 22.30% | 14.80% | 48.60% | 40.30% |
| 16-20 | 6.20% | 30.90% | 8.80% | 27.50% | 27.20% | 28.40% | 24.70% | 32.00% |
| 21+ | 0.30% | 13.10% | 1.00% | 3.60% | 27.80% | 51.10% | 2.80% | 9.50% |
| Thomas Schauerman | Tyler Moore | Parker Phillips | Max Manley | Luke Labatte | Adam Wilkinson | Addison Stansbury | Isaac Berg | Trenton Allen | |
| 1 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 2 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 3 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% |
| 4 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.00% |
| 5 | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.20% | 0.00% |
| 6 | 0.30% | 0.10% | 0.40% | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 1.10% | 0.20% |
| 7 | 0.70% | 0.40% | 0.70% | 0.10% | 0.00% | 0.50% | 0.10% | 2.00% | 1.40% |
| 8 | 0.40% | 0.60% | 2.30% | 0.10% | 0.10% | 1.70% | 0.10% | 3.60% | 2.00% |
| 9 | 0.70% | 1.00% | 2.30% | 0.10% | 0.10% | 1.20% | 0.10% | 3.30% | 1.90% |
| 10 | 2.00% | 2.20% | 2.80% | 0.90% | 0.00% | 2.00% | 0.30% | 4.30% | 2.70% |
| 11-15 | 16.50% | 29.00% | 18.20% | 11.70% | 4.60% | 20.90% | 5.10% | 31.40% | 20.50% |
| 16-20 | 27.40% | 43.60% | 33.30% | 39.30% | 22.40% | 39.80% | 29.50% | 31.60% | 37.80% |
| 21+ | 51.90% | 23.10% | 40.00% | 47.80% | 72.80% | 33.80% | 64.80% | 22.40% | 33.50% |
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