Veritas junior Kesandra Fischer competes in the discus event during the Veritas Christian School Invitational, held Saturday in Eudora.

Veritas sophomore Isaiah Nichols approaches the finish line of the 100 during the Veritas Christian School Invitational, held Saturday in Eudora.

Veritas' Grace Brazell competes in the 100 during the Veritas Christian School Invitational, held Saturday in Eudora.

Veritas junior Kesandra Fischer competes in the discus event during the Veritas Christian School Invitational, held Saturday in Eudora.

Veritas junior Kesandra Fischer competes in the 100 hurdles during the Veritas Christian School Invitational, held Saturday in Eudora.

Teri Huslig just started practicing for the triple jump this week for the first time in more than a year. The senior at Veritas Christian looked like a savvy veteran at the Veritas Invitational on Saturday.

Huslig won the triple jump and placed second in the long jump, which helped Veritas’ girls track and field team to eighth place at Eudora High.

Though no team strives to take eighth place at a meet, the Eagles only have four girls and three boys on their high school track and field squad. That means their athletes have to compete in more events than most schools to make up ground.

Huslig, who will walk on to Kansas University’s track team next year, did more than her share, scoring half of Veritas’ points in the team standings. It was also unexpected, as she leapt 32 feet, 6 inches in the triple jump.

“I completely switched my steps. I’ve been doing it completely differently, so I was really happy with my PR,” said Huslig, who hadn’t triple jumped since her sophomore year. “I also broke our school record for it, so I was really pleased. I didn’t expect that to happen at all today.”

The immediate success for Huslig comes as no surprise, since she comes from an athletic family.

Her younger sister, Tori, a freshman, dominates in basketball and softball while Teri stars in track and on the volleyball court.

Her triple-jump win and personal record give her a boost to work harder for the rest of the season.

“It just helps me trust my coaches a lot more, and it also helps build confidence just knowing that I haven’t been working on it that long at all, and I’m already having success,” Huslig said. “I just can’t wait to get back into the weight room and get practicing and just continuing to build my strength and get better at it.”

The girls’ team added the rest of its points when sophomore Grace Brazell and junior Kesandra Fischer were the only participants in the pole vault, and they both cleared the bar at 5 feet, 6 inches.

Brazell also added an eighth-place finish in the 100-meter hurdles, and Fischer was ninth in the discus, while distance runner Hanna Grubbs took 15th in the 800.

Meanwhile, Veritas’ three boys finished in ninth place. Freshman Seth Hale had two top-five finishes, taking fourth in the 200 and tying for fourth in the 100.

Hale owes a lot of his success Saturday to his mother, who noticed that his track shoes seemed too big when he was running. Hale downgraded to a size 91?2 track shoes from his previous 10s and set personal records in the 200 and in the 400, in which he placed seventh.

“I’ve been working really hard recently, trying to do the best I can,” Hale said. “I really wanted to do well since this is the Veritas track meet. I wanted to do well for my whole school and show them how well I’ve been doing this year.”

Isaiah Nichols finished behind Hale in the 100 and 200, while Isaac Slane finished 15th in the shot put and 16th in the discus.

“They did well,” Veritas coach Renee Grubbs said. “I think most of our kids have all PR’d today, so we did a good job. This is a lot more competition than we’ve had in any of the (previous) meets, so it really pushed them to do their best.”