Kankakee Valley High School

Kankakee Valley High School boys' cross country team placed sixth out of 27 teams in the AA division at the New Prairie Invitational on Saturday, September 20, 2025. Up from 11th place last year, the finish marks KV's highest finish since 2019. Runner-up a year ago, senior Matt Hoffman covered the challenging course 14 seconds faster with the same result. "Matt has consistently run ahead of his performances of a year ago all season," stated Coach Adams. Hoffman's time of 16:28 fell only 7 seconds shy of his last outing at New Prairie: regionals in 2024. Senior Owen Sharp's 17:30 marks his best race at New Prairie, placing him on the awards stand in 27th place. Junior Markus Terborg matched his teammate's feats, with his 17:52 and 38th place in the field of 235 runners. "Again, they are ahead of where they were last year, which is always the goal as an athlete ages up, levels up. It's no secret that if we are going to step up in team placing, it starts with these two." Freshman Milo Herz got his first taste of Agony Hill and New Prairie's course, crossing in 48th place in 18:00, followed by junior Luke Ehrhardt in 52nd place (18:07). "As a tandem as our fourth and fifth scorers today, these two cut off 2:01 of those spots on last year's team. This has been true all season, which begs the question: can we finish any higher in the post season?" In the remaining squad, performances of note included the PR performances of Garrett Boer (-:24), Chase Vander Meer (-:26), and Grant Duttlinger (-:23). "These guys are learning with every race how to take on the challenge of the 5k, but the New Prairie course is not a cake walk; who gets a PR in mid-season there? These guys!" Other finishers for KV: Trent Hopper (19:10) Noah Knoerzer (19:45) Garrett Boer (20:34, PR) Chase Vander Meer (20:45, PR) Grant Duttlinger (23:43, PR) "Overall, we dropped the third greatest amount of time compared to our competitors. One moved from ninth in 2024 to 1st today; the other moved from 10th to first in the A division. While we moved up, another 10 seconds a runner would have put us in first place. We've got to figure out how to gut it out just that much more."