Kris Grimes, Keaton Daniel Earn USTFCCCA Regional Awards

NEW ORLEANS, La. — Kentucky track & field Assistant Coach Kris Grimes and senior Keaton Daniel earned United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Southeast Region awards this afternoon for their achievements during the 2024 indoor season.

Daniel was named the southeast region’s Men’s Field Athlete of the Year while Assistant Coach Kris Grimes was named the Men’s Assistant Coach of the Year.

This is the first time Daniel has earned the award. Daniel, who hails from Henderson, Nevada, won the pole vault at the 2024 NCAA DI Indoor Track & Field Championships with a clearance of 5.70m (18-8¼) and earned his fifth straight Southeastern Conference gold medal at the SEC Indoor Championships last month. Earlier in the season, Daniel topped 5.70m (19-0¼) for the collegiate lead at the Corky Classic. These achievements have led Daniel to receive votes on The Bowerman Watchlist.

Grimes, in his sixth year as an assistant coach at Kentucky, coached Daniel to a program’s first national title in the pole vault at the 2024 NCAA DI Indoor Track & Field Championships, along with a runner-up finish by Luke Brown in the triple jump. That duo scored all 18 points for Kentucky finishing 11th as a team, the highest finish for the men’s program at an indoor championship since 1996. Daniel and Brown also won titles in their specialty at the SEC Indoor Championships. It marks Grimes’ third USTFCCCA Assistant Coach of the Year award.

The Southeast Region is comprised of 35 Division I schools in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Kentucky. Daniel and Grimes will now move to a national ballot that includes all region winners, plus the coaches of the top-four placing programs at the national championships in the Men’s and Women’s Coach of the Year categories.

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