Watson Placed 4th

Gage Watson of Winner High School placed 10th at the Chamberlain golf meet on Aug. 30.

Placers for middle school boys include Karson Keiser, 2nd; Ryder Halligan, 3rd and Landon Calhoon, 6th.

Gage Watson of Winner placed 4th in the Big Dakota Conference golf tournament Sept. 6 in Chamberlain.

Watson shot an 88.

Nathan Monk shot a 112.

Chamberlain won the team title.

Runners Compete in Sioux Falls

Winner Area cross country team took part in the Nike Heartland preview cross country meet on Saturday.

In the girls varsity, Sidda Schuyler placed 9th; Saige Schuyler, 48th; Meagan Blare, 78th; Melanie Brozik, 81st; Aryn Meiners, 92nd and Jaclyn Lapath, 99th.

In the junior varsity boys race, Wyatt Turnquist was 57th and Joseph Laprath was 106th.

The next meet for the Winner Area team will be Sept. 13 at Chamberlain and Sept. 15 at Lyman.

Cowgirls Down Lyman

Colome volleyball team defeated Lyman on Sept. 4. The scores were 25-23, 25-12 and 25-15.

Serve leaders were Rayne Hermsen, 18 points, 4 aces; Makayla Shippy, 8 points, 2 aces; Saydee Heath, 7 points, 1 ace.

Kill leaders were Kaydee Heath, 11; Haley Krumpus, 6 and Hermsen, 5.

Rayne Hermsen, Kaydee Heath and Saydee Heath each had 1 block.

Shippy had 9 digs, Saydee Heath, 8.

Shippy had 22 assists.

The Cowgirls played Tripp-Delmont/Armour on Sept. 8. The Cowgirls lost the match.

Serve leaders were Saydee Heath, 10 points, 1 ace; Shippy, 6 points, 2 aces.

Kaydee Heath and Hermsen each had 8 kills.

Hermsen and Kaydee Heath each had 1 block.

Shippy had 12 digs, Krumpus, 9 and Kaydee Heath, 8.

Shippy had 14 assists.

Colome Record Improves to 3-0… #3 in Class 9B!

Chase Dufek ran for 166 yards and scored two touchdowns as the Colome Cowboys defeated Burke/South Central 62-12 Friday. The victory gives Colome a 3-0 record.

Jackson Kinzer ran for 81 yards with a touchdown.

In passing, Kinzer had 13 completions for 193 yards.

Layton Thieman had 103 yards receiving and two touchdowns.

Colome has a bye week this week with no football game.

The next game will be he homecoming game on Sept. 14 when they host Gayville-Volin.

Warriors Play Strong in Victory

Winner High School football team made a strong showing as they defeated West Central 36-7 Friday night in Winner.

The Warriors scored 28 first half points. Coach Dan Aaker says this is best first half Winner has played in a year and a half.

We came out focused and ready to play,” he said.

The Warriors scored on its first four possessions. Trevor Peters opened the scoring on a 7 yard run. At the end of the first quarter, quarterback Brady Fritz scored on a 21 yard run.

Fritz got on the board again with 5:27 left in the second quarter on a 11 yard run.

Aaker explained the Warriors drive at the end of the first half was really big. The team did a good job of utilizing the clock with Peters scoring on a 6 yard run with 28 seconds left in the first half.

The coach said the Warriors had good balance with Phillip Jorgensen, Brady Fritz, Trevor Peters and Sam Kruger running well.

West Central scored in the 4th quarter with 8:50 left in the game.

Winner’ final score came on a 20 yard run by Fritz.

The Warriors had 417 yards rushing and 23 first downs.

Fritz was the leading rusher with 116 yards followed by Jorgensen, 98; Peters, 76; Kruger, 37 and Nolan Sachtjen, 33.

In passing, Fritz was 2-5 for 26 yards.

Winner’s defense was led by Shea Connot with 9 tackles, Brandon Volmer, 7; Preston Norrid, Colton Schroeder and Oscar Pravecek, 5 each and Kruger, 4.

Aaker said in the second half Winner did not play as sharp. “Our guys learned that they need to keep focused all the time,” said the coach.

This will be a bye week for the Warriors as they will have no football game. The next game will be Sept. 14 at Valentine, Neb.

This week in practice the team will get back to fundamentals like they worked on earlier in the season.

The coaching staff will start introducing information on Valentine game but basically this will be a Winner Warriors week.

Lady Warriors Runners Take 4th Place

The Winner Area girls cross country team took fourth place at the McCook Central/Montrose Invitational on Aug. 28.

Sidda Schuyler led the Lady Warriors as she placed fourth.

Also placing for the Winner Area girls were: Saige Schuyler, 12th; Meagan Blare, 26th; Melanie Brozik, 32nd; Aryn Meiners, 37th; Jaclyn Laprath, 47th.

Placing for the varsity boys were Wyatt Turnquist, 41st; Joseph Laprath, 71st.

In the girls junior varsity race, Madison Thieman was 16th and Gabby Kocer was 41st and Trinity Vrbka, 57th.

The next action for the team will be Sept. 8 in Sioux Falls.

Lady Warriors Rise to #2 in Class A

Winner High School volleyball team picked up an impressive win over Burke/South Central last Tuesday.  The Lady Warriors won in five sets.  The scores were 25-20, 25-19, 19-25, 22-25, 15-13.

Alexis Richey and Gracie Littau each were 100 percent in serving.  Morgan Hammerbeck had 3 aces serves, Ellie Brozik, 2.  Hammerbeck had 20 kills followed by Ellie Brozik, 13 and Abby Marts, 8.  Mackenzie Levi had 34 set assists.  Addy Root had 10 set assists.  Richey had 30 digs and Hammerbeck 21.  Marts had five block assists and Littau, 2.

As a team, Winner was 93 percent in serving with 9 ace serves, 51 kills and 48 set assists.  The team had 108 digs

Burke is a good team and brought back quite a few from last year,” said coach Jaime Keiser. “They have a very balanced and athletic tam. We came out ready to play and did a great job of being aggressive attacking and serving,” said Keiser.

The Winner coach noted Burke had some hard hitters and they did a great job of attacking the ball in sets 3 and 4 which kept us out of the system.

It went back and forth in set 5 and it came down to who made the less mistakes. We played with a lot of intensity and never gave up after losing in sets 4 and 5,” said Keiser.

The Lady Warriors defeated Ainsworth, Neb., in four sets on Aug. 30. The scores were 25-15, 25-11, 19-25 and 15-14.

Hammerbeck was 100 percent in serving and Richey was 94 percent. Brozik had 6 ace serves and Kalla Bertram, 4.  Hammerbeck had 21 kills, Marts, 8 and Brozik, 7. Levi had 36 set assists. Richey had 22 digs and Hammerbeck, 17. Hammerbeck had 2 assist blocks, Marts and Bertram, 1 each.

As a team, Winner was 93 percent in serving, with 13 set assists, 42 kills.  The team had 79 digs and 2 blocks.

Coach Keiser said: “We came out ready to play and played very well in the first and second set. We did a great job of serving and attacking the ball. In the third set we struggled with serve receive and attacking the ball and dug ourselves a hole. We fought back and had the momentum going into game 4 even though we lost set 3.

I was proud that we played together as a team and never gave up after losing set 3,” said Keiser.

Winner volleyball team beat Valentine, Neb., on Aug. 30 in three sets—25-22, 25-11 and 25-19.

Addy Root and Morgan Hammerbeck were 100 percent in serving. Ellie Brozik and Root each had 2 ace serves. Hammerbeck had 12 kills and Abby Marts, 8.  Richey and Gracie Littau had 17 digs.  Marts had 4 solo blocs and 1 block assist.  Kalla Bertram had 1 solo block and 1 block assist.

As a team, Winner was 93 percent in serving with 7 ace serves, 34 kills, 31 set assists and 78 digs.

We came out a little flat,” said coach Jaime Keiser. “Valentine has a great volleyball program and always has competitive teams. We did a great job of serving and kept Valentine out of system. We did a great job of attacking the ball, which kept Valentine scrambling and out of system. We also did a great job of talking and working together as a team,” said Keiser.

The next action for Winner will be Sept. 11 at Lyman.

Colome Places 4th in Tournament

Colome volleyball team took fourth place at the Gregory tournament on Saturday, Sept. 1.

In the first match, Colome defeated St. Francis 25-21, 20-25 and 25-15.

Serving leaders were Rayne Hermsen, 9 points and one ace, Makayla Shippy, 8 points and 4 aces.

Kaydee Heath and Rayne Hermsen had 7 kills and Haley Krumpus, 5.

Kaydee Heath had 3 blocks and Hermsen, 2.

Shippy had 8 digs and Heath, 7.

Shippy had 21 assists.

The Cowgirls lost to Boyd Co. 19-25, 14-25.

Hermsen had 9 points and one ace.

Hermsen and Baylie Hoffine each had 4 kills. Haley Krumpus and Heath had 3 kills.

Carleen Burger had 3 blocks.

Heath and Hermsen had 6 digs each and Krumpus, 5.

Shippy had 5 assists.

Colome defeated Jones County 21-25, 25-13 and 26-24.

Hermsen had 19 points and five aces with Shippy having 9 points and 6 aces.

Heath had 17 kills and Krumpus and Hoffine, 4 each.

Heath had 3 blocks and Hermsen, 2.

Hermsen had 8 digs and Hoffine, 7. Krumpus and Heath had 6 digs each,

In the third and fourth place match Colome lost to Lyman County. Scores of the match were 10-25, 25-19 and 15-25.

Hermsen had 6 points and one ace and Jaclyn Laprath had 5 points and an ace.

Heath had 11 kills and Krumpus, 4.

Heath had 3 blocks.

Krumpus had 9 digs and Shippy, 8.

Shippy had 18 set assists.

Colome travels to Tripp-Delmont/Armour on Sept. 8 and hosts Marty on Sept. 10 and travels to Platte on Sept. 11.

Girls Cross Country Team Wins First Place

Winner area girls cross country team took first place at the local Winner Invitational on Friday.

Sidda Schuyler won first place in 20:58.60.

Saige Schuyler took third in 22:38.35.

Also placing for the Lady Warriors were Melanie Brozik, 5th, 24:07.49; Jaclyn Laprath, 6th, 24:45.20; Meagan Blare, 7th, 24:49.16; Aryn Meiners, 9th, 25:06.71; Madison Thieman, 11th, 25:28.34.

In the varsity boys, Kade Watson placed 5th, Wyatt Turnquist, 8th in 20:04.50.

Joseph Laprath placed 15th in 22:20.20.

In the girls junior varsity race, Katherine Jankauskas took 4th, Gabby Kocer, 5th; Trinity Vrbka, 6th

In the junior varsity boys, Konner Osborn placed first.

The next meet for the Winner Area team will be Sept. 4 at Scotland.

Colome Flirts with Record

By South Dakota Public Broadcasting

On Friday Aug. 17, night, high school football season kicked off in South Dakota for all three nine-man classes and class 11B. It’s always said that records are meant to be broken, and that nearly happened opening night when Colome hosted Centerville.

The theme of this game was lots of scoring… for the Cowboys that is. Coach Ben Connot’s Cowboys were victorious 72-6. Yes, you read that correctly, Colome scored 72-points. And it to make it even more impressive, all of the scoring occurred in just the first half.

For Class 11A, 11B, and all three nine-man classes, there’s a mercy rule. If a team has a lead of 50-points by the end of the first half, or if they secure a lead of that magnitude in the second half, the game is over.

Colome’s 72-point performance didn’t break a record but it came close. In South Dakota nine-man football history, Avon has the record for the most points scored in one half of football with 76. That record occurred in 2004, and it was a season that concluded with Avon winning the Class 9A State Championship.

Cowboys head coach Ben Connot said he’s proud of the way his team played to open the season. He mentioned the importance executing plays, and how preparation in practice correlated over to game day.

“I think a big thing is confidence. We’re doing a few things a little different this year than we did last year, so to come out that first game and execute – to show that we can put points on the board,” said Connot. “We relayed the message that we do have some confidence and that we can call any play and it’s going to work.”

Colome is currently ranked No. 3 in the South Dakota Media Preps High School Football poll, behind only Sully Buttes (No. 1) and Castlewood (No. 2). With the Cowboys football program receiving well-deserved respect from around the state, Coach Connot is keeping his team focused.

“It starts on the practice field and a sense of urgency in everything we do, making every rep count,” explained Connot. “Being on top of the kids for focus and just staying disciplined. Every game counts when you look at seed points and all that, so really we just try to keep kids locked in to practice and hope we execute the same way in our games.”