Waukon baseball team splits pair of District 5 contests at home, beats Osage, 21-2, in semifinals and has season ended with 5-4 loss to Denver
Tracking down a fly ball ... Waukon baseball senior left fielder Caden Cahoon latches on to a fly ball for an out in the Indians’ 5-4 home loss to Denver in the Class 2A District 5 championship game Saturday, July 11. Cahoon smacked a single and scored a run, while tracking down two fly balls for outs in the final game of his career in a Waukon uniform. View and find out how to purchase this photo and more by clicking on the Photos link on this webpage.
The Waukon baseball team was able to host a pair of Class 2A District 5 Tournament games this past week, playing to a split of those contests to ultimately have its 2026 summer season brought to a close. After receiving a first-round district tournament bye with a District 5 best 22-5 season record, the Indians made short work of their first postseason opponent with a 21-2 home victory over Osage in a mercy-rule four innings Tuesday, July 7. Advancing to the District 5 championship game with that win, the diamond Tribe matched up with an overall young Denver squad at home Saturday, July 11 and had its own late rally overcome by an even later and greater Cyclone comeback to fall by a 5-4 result and have its 2026 campaign brought to a close.
The Indians closed out their best season in nearly two decades with an overall record of 22-6, marking the first time since the 2008 season a Waukon baseball team has finished with a winning record and recording the most wins since that 2008 season’s 31 victories. It had also been the 2007 season since the diamond Tribe had finished atop any type of conference standings, marking the only time Waukon baseball ever won the Northeast Iowa Conference, as this season saw the Indians finish as the winner of the Large School division of the newly-formatted Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) with a 14-3 overall UIC mark that placed them ahead of the other four Large School UIC squads and landed them behind UIC Small School and overall UIC champion South Winneshiek’s 16-1 overall conference record and tied with Small School runner-up Kee’s 14-3 UIC mark.
With its District 5 championship victory, Denver advanced on to the Substate 3 championship game. The Cyclones were scheduled to take their 11-14 season record into that title game against fifth-rated Cascade and its 26-1 season mark Tuesday, July 14 at Manchester, with the winner of that contest advancing on to the Class 2A State Tournament being held in Carroll July 21-24.
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