Sports

The 2016 cross country season came to a close for all but one member of the Kee cross country team at the Hawks’ Class 1A State Qualifying Meet at Cedar Falls Thursday, October 20. That one member is Kee girls sophomore Katie Brennan, who finished just within the brink of top-15 individual State Meet qualification to lead the Kee cross country girls to their own brink of team qualification for the State Meet with a fourth-place finish just beyond the top-three finish required for team qualification. Brennan’s State Cross Country Meet qualification is believed to be the first for the Lady Hawks of any kind since the 1996 season when the Kee girls qualified as a team.

Game result leaves grid Tribe short of State Play-Off bid

Despite winning three of four quarters, the Waukon football team had its 2016 season brought to a close Friday evening, October 21, but not before battling for its State Play-Off life right down to the final seconds of a 34-16 loss at Class 2A’s top-rated North Fayette Valley. The Indians held the host TigerHawks to just seven points throughout the game’s final three quarters while outscoring them with 16 points of their own, but a 27-0 first-quarter eruption by North Fayette Valley proved to be too much to overcome.

Friday’s loss came to the same program and at the same location where many of this season’s Indian gridders also had their season and play-off run ended last fall in the quarterfinal round of the Class 2A State Play-Offs.

The Kee football team ended its season on a dominating note, posting its largest margin of victory this season with a 61-13 rout of winless West Central at home Friday, October 21. The win ends the Hawks’ 2016 season with a 3-6 overall record, including a 3-3 mark that placed the Hawks fourth in the final seven-team standings in Eight-Player District 3.

Rud led Kee’s defense with five solo tackles and four assisted stops, being joined by junior William Mitchell in each wrapping up a solo quarterback sack. Carroll and fellow senior Jacob Walleser each added four solo stops, with senior Tyler Reinhart and sophomore Shawn Wild each adding three individual defensive halts.

The Kee volleyball team had its 2016 season brought to a halt in a place where the Hawks also ended their regular season dual match schedule just five days earlier, both by similar results. The volleyball Hawks returned to Central Elkader Tuesday, October 18 after having just been swept by the host Warriors October 13 in Upper Iowa Conference regular season play. Although the Hawks crept a little bit closer in each of three set results, they were still unable to avoid the sweep and the end to their season, falling to Central Elkader by scores of 20-25, 17-25 and 16-25.

With the win, Central advanced to a Monday, October 24 regional quarterfinal match at 14th-rated Edgewood-Colesburg. The Warriors had their season ended in three straight sets by scores of 12-25, 15-25 and 12-25.

The Waukon High School football team took its Class 2A State Play-Off hopes right down to the final seconds, but was ultimately denied a fourth play-off qualification in the past five years with a 34-16 loss at Class 2A top-rated North Fayette Valley Friday, October 21. With that loss, the Indians fell out of automatic play-off contention by finishing as the third-place team in Class 2A District 4.

The Waukon volleyball team wrapped up its regular season by bringing an end to both its Northeast Iowa Conference dual match and tournament season. That regular season dual match schedule came to a close with a five-set loss in a marathon home match with Decorah Tuesday, October 11 before the volleyball Tribe played to just a single match win at the Northeast Iowa Conference Tournament Saturday, October 14 to finish in seventh place.

Finishing the Northeast Iowa Conference season with a similar result as its Northeast Iowa Conference Tournament effort - a single match win in six matches, the Indian netters finished their regular season with a 9-23-1 overall record. The volleyball Tribe will now begin postseason tournament play Wednesday, October 19 at and against North Fayette Valley, details of which can be found in a shaded box elsewhere on these same pages.

The Kee cross country team competed at the Upper Iowa Conference Meet hosted by Starmont High School at Arlington Thursday, October 13, the Hawks’ final meet before their postseason effort to extend their season. The Hawks tallied team scores in both the varsity girls and  boys races, the Kee girls finishing fourth and the boys placing sixth.

“It was an excellent night to run,” Kee cross country coach Pat Wagner said.

GIRLS VARSITY TEAM SCORES
South Winneshiek 34; Central Elkader 46; Edgewood-Colesburg 100; KEE 101; North Fayette Valley 143; Clayton Ridge 145; Starmont 166; MFL/MarMac 188

BOYS VARSITY TEAM SCORES
South Winneshiek 23; Starmont 35; North Fayette Valley 80; Central Elkader 103; Clayton Ridge 136; KEE 163

BOYS MIDDLE SCHOOL TEAM SCORES
Postville 50; North Fayette Valley 52; South Winneshiek 55; KEE 65; Edgewood-Colesburg 70; Central Elkader 88

A somewhat depleted Waukon football team riddled by injury from its first Class 2A District 4 loss of the season a week earlier showed little sign of that depletion in dominating a winless Oelwein squad on the road Friday, October 14. Minus their first and second string quarterbacks and most veteran wide receiver, the Indians, instead, ran rampant over the host Huskies and limited Oelwein to just 122 yards of total offense in posting a 48-8 victory, more than half of those Husky yards coming in the fourth quarter of the ballgame.

“We stressed the importance of each player doing his job, pointing out the absence of other players does not impact each individual’s performance,” Waukon football coach Chad Beermann said. “Basically, if I am left tackle, it does not matter who is carrying the ball, I have a job to do.”

A rung on the Class 2A District 4 championship ladder was at stake when two of the District’s three still undefeated teams took to the field at Upper Iowa University in Fayette Friday,

October 7. Even though the fourth-rated Waukon football team was technically the home team for the neutral site, it was the second-rated Union Knights that made themselves feel more at home in handing the gridiron Tribe a 37-16 defeat.

“Union’s size and speed was better than ours,” Waukon football coach Chad Beermann said. “In addition, we tackled poorly. We have also lived off turnovers, and Union recovered their only fumble, though we did have five to six kids in the area.”

The Kee volleyball team battled through its busiest week of the season, playing what amounted to nine total matches in a five-day span. The Hawks split a double dual at Turkey Valley Tuesday, October 4, winning three of four sets to defeat the host school in an Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) match but also falling to New Hampton in two straight sets. The Kee netters then swept a second UIC match from Postville in three straight sets at home Thursday, October 6 before winning five of six matches at the Riceville Tournament Saturday, October 8 to claim at least a share of the tournament title.