Scheels Athlete of the Week: Liberty High Junior Decker Continues Strong Season With Top-Three Finish at MVC Super Meet
Ryan Murken
Your Prep Sports
IOWA CITY – Since breaking onto the high school cross country two years ago as a freshman Keegan Decker has been clocking fast times and chasing high goals.
As the times have consistently dropped for Decker over the past two seasons the goals for the Liberty High standout junior have continued to soar higher and higher.
A state title contender and regarded as one of the top distance runners in the country Decker continues to rewrite his own goals while building on an already impressive prep running resume.
“A lot of my goals did have to change,” Decker said. “Freshman year one of my goals was winning a state title and now I am looking more at the national level and I just want to see how far I can take it.”
In his first three seasons Decker has already taken things pretty far.
After finishing 17th at the Class 4A state meet as a freshman Decker dropped 44 seconds off his state meet time while placing third at the 4A state meet last season in 15:10.1 to cap a breakthrough sophomore season.
Decker has continued to soar this fall.
He finished third at the Mississippi Valley Conference Super Meet for the second consecutive season last Thursday in a time of 14:49.3.
“A lot of it has been just building up mileage,” Decker said. “I hit some mileage I’ve never hit before this summer and that was definitely a part of it but a lot of it was just doing the little stuff. Showing up every day, lifting, strides and getting the miles in.”
Decker is current ranked second in the Class 4A individual rankings by the Iowa Association of Track Coaches and was on the watch list of the Top-30 national individual rankings by DyeStat last week.
Ahead of Decker in the 4A rankings is defending state runner-up Jaden Merrick of Cedar Falls.
Merrick and defending 3A champion Quentin Nauman of Western Dubuque were the two runners to finish in front of Decker at the MVC Super Meet last week.
Nauman, who set an Iowa all-time record earlier this season while edging Decker at the Jim Boughton Invitational, is ranked seventh in the DyeStat national rankings
“It’s great having some of the best guys in the nation right here in this state,” Decker said. “Racing with Quentin and Jaden it’s always a great and I know it’s going to be fantastic competition every time I’m with them.”
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