Devils win 15 events at Eagle Valley Track and Field Invitational

Kaden Kraft and Zakia Shreeve each won four events

Sports Sports | Apr 9, 2024

Ryan Sederquist

**Kevin Hasley placed second in the 110-meter hurdles and won the 300-meter hurdles at the Eagle Valley Invitational on Saturday.**
*Rex Keep/Courtesy photo*

Cold, wind and even some snow made Saturday’s Eagle Valley Invitational admittedly dreary. It did little, however, in dampening the Devils’ dominance.

In fact, after watching his athletes win 15 of the 36 events, head track and field coach Jeff Shroll could be convinced this team is the most talented and versatile he’s ever coached.

“This would rank up there for sure,” he said. “We won 3A state with seven guys (in 2004). This is probably the deepest team since we’ve been in 4A. Last year was great, too.”

Junior Zakia Shreeve and Senior Kaden Kraft led the way Saturday — both went 3-for-3 across individual races and hopped on a winning relay team as well.

Eagle Valley junior Zakia Shreeve won the 100-meter hurdles in a time of 17.36 seconds. She also won the 300-meter hurdles and the long jump.

“I can’t remember a time where I had our top guy and girl both win all four of their events,” Shroll said. Shreeve started the day guiding the 800-meter sprint medley team to a four-second win before claiming both 100 and 300-meter hurdles crowns and the long jump title. Kraft won the 100, 200 and 400-meter dashes and took gold in the 4×100. In that event, even the Devils’ ‘B’ squad placed second overall.

Despite challenging, changing conditions, Eagle Valley posted impressive marks across the board.

Kevin Hasley came back from a silver in the 110-meter hurdles to win the 300-meter distance, missing the meet record in the latter hurdle event by 0.02 seconds. Kenzie Cosper won the pole vault by a foot and the distance crew went 1-2-3 in the mile thanks to Tyler Blair (4:35.39), Armando Fuentes (4:35.84) and Cooper Filmore (4:39.30). Fuentes came back later in the day to win the 800-meters by three seconds.

“He is an absolutely gorgeous 800-meter runner,” Shroll said of Fuentes, who ran 2:02 in the two-lap race. “He looks phenomenal, looks strong, and his stride is just brutal to keep up with.”

Dylan Blair, Cooper Filmore, Armando Fuentes and Tyler Blair set the pace in the 1600-meter run on Saturday.

The Devils almost occupied all eight scoring spots in the 1600.

“I mean, that’s pretty cool to be able to do that in the weather conditions we had, so really proud of those guys,” Shroll said. “The way they train together, work hard and how Coach Janssen and Blair have got them — it’s really fun to watch.”

Lily Brueck and Tabi Schroeder battle to the line in the 200-meter dash. Brueck took the win by one-hundredth of a second.

Lily Brueck broke 50-seconds to place third in the 300-meter hurdles and was fifth in the 100-meter hurdles as well. The sophomore finished the day with a win in the 200-meter dash (27.45), leaning past Battle Mountain’s Tabi Schroeder by one-hundredth of a second.

“She’s got really good acceleration off the corner,” said Shroll, who leans into stamina and strength in his training approach with Brueck.

“I almost train her like a 400-meter runner,” he continued. “Every once in awhile you get those kids — they’re super sweet, super shy, super nice — but they hate to lose. And that kind of describes Lily. She hates losing.”

Range and versatility was the theme of the day, with Allie Braun winning the high jump with a leap of 5-feet even and also placing third in the 100-meter dash. Then there’s Ashley Jones, who, like Brueck, does both the 4×100 and 4×800.

“I just have not had girls I’m going to put in the open 100 and also a 4×800 relay that has the potential to be in the top 18 in the state,” Shroll said.

“A lot of kids are buying into that kind of training to be flexible and move around.”

Kraft will do just that at the team’s next meet. He’s expected to run the open 800 on Saturday in Glenwood Springs.

“You can do so much more with your relay teams when you have that kind of depth and range with an athlete,” said Shroll.

While Rob Parish was busy coaching a group of five athletes at the Arcadia Invitational on Friday and Saturday, he was impressed by performances back in the valley, particularly from Schroeder, who won the 100-meter dash by 0.36 seconds.

Kaden Kraft takes the baton in the 4×100-meter relay. The Devils fielded three teams in the event and placed first, second and fifth, respectively. Kraft also won three individual events at the meet.

“I think she was awesome,” the coach said before adding Husky coaches are excited with the team’s forward progress. “We’re having a lot of fun.”

Jakob Methvin and Caleb Hodges earned fifth-place finishes for Battle Mountain in the 200 (25.00) and 400 (52.88), respectively. Caden McCommons was second in the discus (118-08.50) and Charlie Strauch jumped 18-00.75 to place fifth in the long jump as well.

As of Tuesday, the forecast for Glenwood Springs on Saturday looks to be markedly different from the Devils’ home meet. Shroll listed off several athletes he thinks could set new personal bests if the wind holds off.

“It will be nice to have some sun and warm temperatures.”

Full results for the Eagle Valley Invitational can be found at co.milesplit.com.