Jessie Black has proudly represented multiple sports and multiple schools

As the postseason ramps up, Jessie Black will spend the last days of spring playing two different sports for two different schools. For the Delta High School girls soccer team, she’s the state’s leading goal-scorer and one of the top forwards in the nation. For the Cedaredge High School track and field team, she’s likely to repeat as a state champion and excels in every event she attempts.

It’s not unheard of for an athlete to compete in multiple sports simultaneously, especially in a smaller school district. What is exceedingly rare is continuing both at the NCAA Division I level. Next fall, Black will begin her journey at the United States Naval Academy, where she’ll run track and play soccer. Instead of splitting three sports across two seasons and two schools, she’s likely to focus on one at a time in coastal Maryland.

And as thankful as her coaches are for everything she brings to her Delta County teams, including Delta High School soccer coach Audrey Reedy, it’s hard not to see Black’s potential at the next level with a narrowed focus.

“I’m kind of jealous of Navy,” Reedy said. “Because they get all of her for soccer, and all of her for track. They don’t have to split her like we do.”

Still, Black’s signing day at Cedaredge High School attracted high school and club soccer teammates from all over the Western Slope. It drew friends and opponents alike from across the entire county who knew her from her basketball, and an even larger section of the track and field community. All of them gathered to watch one of the best athletes the Western Slope has seen sign with the Naval Academy. While her athletic endeavors are split, especially in the spring, her successes bring people together.

A Naval Academy flag was draped over the center of the table, winged on her right by a Cedaredge track top, and on her left by Delta soccer and Grand Junction Fire FC jerseys. Reedy spoke, as did Fire FC coach Danny Molineaux. Cedaredge track coach Dante Markley and strength and conditioning coach Cutter Garrison sang her praises.

Black said she’s incredibly thankful for all of her coaches, but perhaps most telling was the response from her teammates.

“Everybody spoke,” Markley said. “Everybody had the biggest smiles on their faces. When (fellow track athlete and basketball player) Lily Sinkay got up there, everybody was emotional, and she said, ‘It couldn’t happen to a better teammate.’

“Everybody feels that way and it’s because she’s such a force for good. She’s not fake; she’ll make sure and tell you. But it’s always positive with her and it’s always about the team.”

It seems like a natural transition for a team-oriented, highly motivated, academically inclined and athletically gifted young person to pursue a service academy. But the interest really started with her brother, Nathan Black, attending the United States Coast Guard Academy. His experience pushed her to reach out to coaches and she was originally going to run track with the Navy. But soccer had always been here favorite sport and she wasn’t quite ready to give up on that dream. So, she reached out to the soccer coaches at Navy, hoping to get a look.

They told her if she could make her way to a tournament in northern Virginia, they’d have a coach there to watch her play. So, Black made the cross-country trip for a chance to chase her dream. But the club team she was signed up to guest play for didn’t even warm up and the club coach wasn’t there. The Navy coach, however, was watching.

“It was pretty much the worst possible situation and I couldn’t get acclimated,” she said. “But it was really God’s plan. I believe that. Because the coach reached out and said they liked how I played and I should come to their camp.”

But the journey there was anything but easy. Black burst onto the scene as a freshman, scoring 31 goals, the most for any frosh in the state that year and seventh in Class 3A. She led the team to an 11-6 record — the first time the Panthers had won more than seven games in at least a decade — and a 6-1 mark in the 3A Western Slope League. They lost 3-1 in the second round of the playoffs to perennial power Colorado Academy.

At the same time, she was a key piece of the Bruins’ 2022 state championship victory in girls track and field. She won the 1,600-meter run by almost 10 seconds. Her time of 2 minutes, 17.79 seconds in the 800 was the fastest in not only 2A, but among all freshman girls in the state.

Even as a 15-year-old, Black seemed destined for greatness. Having a truly self-motivated athlete is rare enough at any age, all her coaches agreed, but especially that young.

Then, four games into her sophomore soccer season, the Panthers’ leading scorer broke a bone in her leg. During the windiest game Reedy and Black can remember, the ball was played out for a Delta corner kick. When the ball curled back into box the box, the Montezuma-Cortez goalie dove into Black’s leg. Immediately, she knew something was wrong. She’d taken plenty of bumps in her career, but never one where her body quit.

“I was crying and desperate to get back out there,” Black said. “Coach Audrey told me if I could run, I could play and it just didn’t happen. When we went the ER, the doctor was shocked I tried to run on it.”

The injury cost her a year of development in soccer and one that is often vital in the college recruiting process. It kept her off the track, where she’d made so many friends and helped the Bruins find sustained success. It held her from the hardwood, where the Bruins had finished 26-4 the year prior and Black had appeared in 26 games as the team’s top defensive specialist.

Reedy said she was worried about Black’s recovery and Markley said he was concerned about her mental well-being. Although it wasn’t always smooth sailing, it didn’t take the star athlete long to find her groove, at least in soccer. Black scored six goals in the first game of her junior year as the Panthers beat Colorado Rocky Mountain 11-2. She added two more against Crested Butte, then a hat trick and two assists against Salida. By the time the season ended, Black had netted 47 goals, the most in the state regardless of classification. The Panthers reached the state semifinals before losing once again to eventual state champion Colorado Academy.

At the same time, she was often the oldest prospect at ID camps still trying to secure a DI soccer offer. Black remembers coaches telling the 2025 prospect that there’s “still hope,” even though she’d missed the prime recruiting window for major college soccer.

In track, however, her times had slowed, and she finished ninth in the 800 and 11th in the 1,600 at state. Black said track “got the short end of the stick” because soccer games were earlier in the week. Without basketball and the conditioning it brought, her stamina wasn’t the same, and she was worn down by the time a Friday or Saturday meet came around.

“Those types of injuries are really serious,” Markley said. “Especially for someone who plays so many contact sports. But I know she struggled a little bit mentally during that track season. It’s tough, even if her work ethic was never in doubt. That’s someone who works to be the best and it’s hard when you’re still battling back like she was. To see her come full circle this year — man, that’s Jessica Black. It’s such a relief to see her back at her full self. There’s so much emotional relief in me knowing that she’s back physically. Because there’s still so much room to grow and she’s going to be unbelievable when she hits that level.”

Indeed, Black was a three-sport force during her senior year. Black said the main reason she returned to the hardwood was to play with her teammates. The second was because of Coleman’s reputation for hard conditioning. Both translated into winning, as she helped the Bruins to their best finish and deepest playoff run in school history. As part of the team’s 25-1 run, she didn’t score often, but she was sixth in 3A with 3.9 assists per game. She was also among the state’s best in steals, averaging 3.5 per game and regularly matching up with the other team’s best guard.

Bruins coach Russell Coleman said Black is a gifted athlete and intelligent basketball player. He also credited her for her ability to handle the basketball as a player whose focus wasn’t one basketball.

But before this season started, she recommitted to the basketball team. Even when knowing her future prospects and focus on other sports, she couldn’t pass up being part of that group again.

“She said she really wanted to play for the basketball team,” Coleman said. “Every rep was at 100%. She’s never late and has a level of maturity that rubs off on other teenagers. She’s really somebody who was playing for the community and was a tremendous leader on our team.”

Beyond basketball, Black credited the weight room and her work with Garrison, the school’s wrestling coach and strength and conditioning teacher, for developing her athleticism. It was also vital for coming back stronger after the injury. Garrison, for his part, says Black is a once-in-lifetime athlete at Cedaredge.

“She’s unstoppable,” he said. “Mentally, physically, she never breaks. She can always do more. You say jump and she’ll ask how high, and still not be satisfied even though she’s blown away any expectation anyone’s ever had.”

Now, as the spring season winds down, the Delta High School girls soccer team is looking to tread new ground. Black has scored 45 goals prior to the playoffs, a mark that’s first in the state and 29th nationally. It’s also likely to grow as the Panthers, seeded third, chase their first state championship in program history.

Black has posted the top time in 2A for the 800, 1,600 and — new for this year — the 300 hurdles. She’s ran the 200 exactly one time — a windy day in March at the Cedaredge Invitational — and currently sits at sixth in the classification.

After that, she’ll look to represent her school and her country on the soccer pitch, the track and in military service.

“She’s a once-in-a-blue-moon thing here in Delta County,” Reedy said. “She’s a great teammate, laser-focused, her speed is unmatched, and she’s a phenomenal person. I’ll be lucky if I coach someone even close to her level ever again.”