MADISON — Coming off a state podium finish, Lac qui Parle Valley/Dawson-Boyd’s Brayson Boike leads the Eagle track and field team into the 2024 season.

Last year, Boike was the Eagles’ lone state qualifier. He earned a Class A state tournament bid in three events: the high jump, the long jump and the triple jump.

While at the state meet, Boike made the most of the opportunity. He set personal-bests with a 22-3.25 mark in the long jump and a 43-10.75 mark in the triple jump to finish as the state runner-up in both events.

Boike’s 6-02 height in the high jump also earned him seventh place in his sophomore season at the state meet. All six finishers ahead of him in the long jump were juniors or seniors and the lone finisher ahead of him in the triple jump was also a senior who has since graduated.

Gavin Carl leads the Eagle boys’ long distance team. As a sophomore, Carl ran a personal-best 10:36.74 in the 3200 meters and a 4:49.02 in the 1600 meters at the section meet. The latter time was six seconds shy of his PR and both results placed him fourth in the section. He was also a key component of the Eagle’s 4×400-meter relay team — alongside James Weber, Justin Perkins and Keegon Wicht — which claimed first place at the Camden Conference meet with a time of 3:48.87. While Perkins and Wicht have since graduated, Weber is returning for another year with the team.

As a group, the Eagles finished fourth in last year’s section meet with 56 points, trailing Montevideo (81), Luverne (80) and MACCRAY/RCW (59). They’ll look to take a leap up to the podium this year.

On the girls side, LQPV/DB had their struggles, finishing 11th in the section.

The girls team tended to perform best in field events. Paige Meyer graduated after placing fourth in the Discus in the section meet last year but Ayiana Hastad returns as a jumper and Hayley Anderson returns as a thrower, giving the Eagles some key senior leadership.

Hastad jumped as high as 5-0 in the high jump last year, finishing second in the Section 3A North subsection meet with that height. A week later, she jumped 4-10 in the section chapionship to claim sixth place there. She also won the 100-meter hurdles at the subsection meet with a time of 17.78 and placed fourth in the triple jump at the meet with a personal-best 31-03 distance.

Anderson was a standout for the Eagles in the shot put. She placed top two in the event in each of her first four meets of the year, throwing a personal-best 32-11 to finish as the runner-up at the Camden Conference meet. She also claimed third in the subsection meet in the shot put and fifth in the meet in the discus, throwing a personal-best 88-03.

The Eagles debuted this season at the Laker Invitational, with the boys finishing as the runners-up in the 15-team meet and the girls claiming third place out of 13 teams.

After Tuesday’s meet was cancelled due to weather conditions, Lac qui Parle Valley/Dawson-Boyd will next compete at Windom on Thursday at 4 p.m.