Your future, our focus
It was a rough start to the 2015-16 season for the Northwest College rodeo team as the bulls were fish-tailing and the broncs had some serious bang in their buck — but the Trappers cowboyed up and put on a good show for their only home competition on Friday and Saturday night.
The scores from both nights don’t paint an accurate picture of what the NWC riders accomplished. Signs of good things to come were hidden within each ride.
“High school to college is a huge step coming in as freshmen and they have seen what it is all about and they know at practices, we are telling them, to stay focused, and keep their position and concentration and they are getting it,” coach Del Nose said.
On Friday, the NWC men ranked third with 478 points, just a few points shy of taking second from University of Montana, Western and trailing Montana State University — both four-year schools.
For the All Around, Lane Lahaye ranked fifth with 176 points and Marlee Mussman was third out of the only three ladies vying for the title with 45 points.
Saturday’s rodeo didn’t go so well for NWC, which ranked fourth with 107.5 points for the men’s team. Sierra Lyons ranked sixth in the women’s All Around with 91.5 points.
“It is called luck of the draw, some were good and some weren’t so good and that is what rodeo is all about,” Del Nose said. “Sierra Lyons had a great ride, I was impressed with her — she got the jitters out and came on in the second rodeo.”
Up next, the Trappers have a double rodeo in Glendive on Sept. 24-27 at Dawson Community College. Nose said the Trappers hope to put together more points there. In the meantime, the rodeo team will continue to have “lots of hard practices” until they leave for Glendive, he said.
“We will be tight, but we have two weeks now (until the next rodeo) and got our first rodeo jitters out of the way,” Del Nose said, noting how surprised he was with how the freshmen did at their first college rodeo. “These kids are dedicated and focused.”
RANK STOCK
Last weekend’s rodeo had some particularly rank roughstock that left two of the Trappers injured on Friday night. Jesse Nelson is suffering from broken ribs and Wyatt Hallett is preparing for surgery on a torn ligament in his hand, said assistant coach Becky Nose.
Several events had no qualified rides from the Trappers and some had no qualified rides from any of the teams due to how rank the roughstock was both nights.
The Trappers didn’t have any riders place in the saddle bronc event, but good form and consistency across the board showed promise for improved scores in future rodeos.
Friday’s rodeo only had four qualified rides for bull riding. Although none were from NWC, Del Nose said he was impressed with freshman Taylor Roberts’ ride.
“He is one of the kids coming out of high school and the bulls are ranker than they are used to getting on,” Del Nose said. “He saw video of his ride and knows what he needs to do to fix it, and that is the attitude these guys have to have.”
The bulls won on Saturday, having tossed every cowboy off before the 8-seconds.
BAREBACK
Friday fared better for the Trapper bareback riders as Robby Cobler tied for second with a 75-point ride alongside Tristan Hansen of University of Montana, Western.
“She bucked nice and I was able to pick her up for a while for 6 seconds and it strung me out on my arm a bit, but I finished my ride and felt good for my first rodeo,” Cobler said. “The last 2 seconds were fine, just played catch up and I was a little late, so she kind of trailed off — could have had a few more points if I had kept to her.”
Cobler competed during parts of each of his previous two years of college rodeo.
“Coming back and riding my first rodeo felt great,” Cobler said. “I got stepped on and dragged around, so I need to heal up a bit.”
Meanwhile, Jesse Nelson was close behind with a 65-point ride for fifth place.
Saturday’s rodeo featured some particularly rank stock and only three cowboys left with qualified rides.
TIE DOWN ROPING
Levi Mydland was the only Trapper to place in the top eight for tie down roping when he tied for eighth place on Saturday with a 12.7-second finish.
STEER WRESTLING
The Trappers lineup of steer wrestlers were the highlight of the weekend with five top-eight finishes between both nights.
Freshman Bubba Boots wasted no time in throwing the steer to the ground on Friday with his 8.1-second time for third place. Lane Lahaye was close behind with 15.4 seconds for sixth.
“Bubba was very competitive in high school and we look for him to be very competitive in college,” Becky Nose said. “We think he is going to be hard to beat in college.”
Boots shaved nearly an entire second off his time on Saturday with a 7.4-second time for fifth. Lahaye cut several seconds off his time, finishing in 9.1 seconds for seventh. Justin Honken brought it in with a 10.6-second time for eighth place.
TEAM ROPING
NWC was the best in the country at the end of regionals last spring for team roping, and Zach Schweigert and Shawn Bird left some big boots to fill. Bird is back in the saddle this season, but with a slight changeup now going in as a heeler instead of header.
“Shawn is a great roper,” Becky Nose said, noting that he’s also doing tie down roping.
On Friday, he was the fastest Trapper heeler with a 7.3-second time for second place, just a third of a second behind first place’s 7.0-second time by Montana State University’s Wyatt Bloom.
Lahaye set the standard for Trapper headers with a 7.3-second time for second place.
“So far, working with Lane is going very well, they will be very competitive,” Becky Nose said. “They need to rope together more. Since school just started, they haven’t been doing it together a lot yet. But, they will be hard to beat.”
Then on Saturday, William Griffel (header) and Robert Magpie (heeler) ranked third with 9.3 seconds.
“Team roping was really close, like within a second,” Becky Nose said.
BARREL RACING
Less than a second’s difference was all it took to go from placing first to not making the top eight in the barrel racing last weekend.
NWC freshman Sierra Lyons was the only Trapper to place in the top eight, tying for fifth place with 17.77 seconds — just 0.42 seconds behind the fastest barrel racer out of both rodeos.
BREAKAWAY ROPING
Much like barrel racing, every fraction of a second counted in the breakaway roping with the top time being 3.3 seconds followed by a three-way tie for second at 3.5 seconds.
NWC freshman Marlee Mussmann placed eighth with 4.6 seconds, just a tenth of a second shy of taking seventh on Friday.
GOAT TYING
The only thing tighter than the knots tied in the goat tying was the competition itself. All of the top eight rides were within 1 second or less of each other. Mussmann’s 8.0-second time for seventh was a mere 0.9 seconds away from first and only a tenth of a second ahead of the time needed to tie for eighth on Friday.
Mussman was back at it with an improved time of 7.9 seconds on Saturday, tying for eighth. Just a tenth of a second ahead of her was Lyons with a 7.8-second time for seventh — a mere 0.8 seconds behind the first place time.