Sports

The Kee baseball team had its 2018 season get underway with an even split of its first four games, hosting a pair of larger Northeast Iowa Conference schools to open its season with a 2-2 result. That season started with a Tuesday, May 22 home doubleheader loss to Decorah by scores of 6-2 and 10-0 in five innings. The baseball Hawks ended the week on the opposite end of that spectrum, sweeping two games from Waukon Saturday, May 26 on the weekend of the annual Shooky Fink Tournament by scores of 5-4 and 11-1 in six innings.

The Hawks were scheduled to begin their Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) season by hosting Postville in a doubleheader Tuesday, May 29 before playing at Riceville Saturday, June 2. Kee will then host Clayton Ridge in another UIC twinbill Monday, June 4 before playing a UIC double-dip Thursday, June 7 at Turkey Valley and then playing two games at Charles City in a tournament Saturday, June 9.

The Kee softball team got its 2018 season off to an undefeated start, sweeping four non-conference teams in a combination of home and away games. The Lady Hawks started the week with a pair of home sweeps against larger teams from the Northeast Iowa Conference, outlasting Decorah Tuesday, May 22 by a 14-10 count before shutting out Waukon, 10-0 in six innings, Friday, May 25. The Kee diamond dwellers then participated in the Jesup Tournament Saturday, May 26, adding two more wins to their opening week success over a pair of top-15 rated teams by scores of 3-2 over Class 2A 14th-rated North Linn and 7-3 over the Class 2A ninth-rated host school, Jesup.

The Waukon baseball team got its 2018 season off to a busy start, although Mother Nature didn’t allow that initial week to be as busy as it could have been. The baseball Tribe got that full initial week off to a victorious start with a 5-1 home win over North Fayette Valley Tuesday, May 22 before coming up shy, 5-3, at South Winneshiek Wednesday, May 23. A home doubleheader with Charles City was rained out after just four innings of game one and rescheduled to be finished June 15 before the Indians had a doubleheader at Kee swept away from them on the weekend of the annual Shooky Fink Tournament Saturday, May 26 by scores of 5-4 and 11-1 in six innings.

The Waukon softball team opened its 2018 season on each end of the win-loss spectrum, starting off the season with a win but having its initial week ended with three consecutive losses to top-15 rated teams. That win came in five innings, 14-4, in the softball Tribe’s season opener Tuesday, May 22 at home against Central Elkader before the Indians fell at Class 4A 15th-rated Waverly-Shell Rock Thursday, May 24, 9-0 and 11-1 in five innings, and then again at Class 1A top-rated Kee Friday, May 25 by a 10-0 count in six innings.

The 2018 Indian Boys Basketball Camps for boys entering fifth through 12th grades this fall are scheduled to take place July 23-26 at the Waukon High School gymnasium. A session for those entering fifth through eighth grades is being held from 2:30-5 p.m. each day, with a session for upcoming freshmen through seniors taking place from 6-9:30 p.m. each of those days.

A check, payable to “Waukon Boys Basketball,” and the registration form below or one previously handed out should be mailed to Jed Hemann at 1793 Hwy 76N, Waukon, IA 52172. The cost for either the high school camp or the fifth-eighth grade camp is $35.

The Indian Boys Basketball Camp will focus on fundamentals, team play and positive attitude. There will be daily teaching with individual attention, drills, games and contests.

There will be a lot of familiarity on the field for the 2018 Waukon softball team, but a brand new face will be leading that familiarity. First-year head softball coach Shane Schellsmidt will be taking the reins of the Lady Indian softball program this season and will be welcomed by 15 players returning with enough experience from last season to have earned a varsity letter.

Although new to the Allamakee Community School District teaching staff this past year and new to coaching the Waukon softball program, Schellsmidt is anything but new to the fundamentals and finer points of a ball diamond and being able to coach all of those, and certainly familiar to the local area. An extensive baseball resumé for the first-year softball coach begins with his All-State player accolades in helping Kee High School win a State Championship and finish as State Runner-Up in two other seasons from 1992-1996.

The 2018 Waukon baseball team will benefit from the return of 14 letterwinners from a squad last season that played to a 7-23 record that included only a single win in 18 Northeast Iowa Conference tries. That veteran group will include a group of six seniors who will provide the greatest share of that leadership for this season’s 45 players on the eighth-12th grade team roster, many of those seniors sporting multiple varsity baseball letters to their credit.

That group of seniors includes Evan Armstead, Garrett Garin, Abe Schwartz, Colin Waters, Isaiah Welch and Mitchell Snitker. “We have a group of seniors that will provide valuable leadership to the younger players,” Waukon baseball coach Jerry Keenan said.

The 2018 Waukon boys track season came to an official end at every team’s and athlete’s ultimate destination, the Iowa High School State Track and Field Meet held at Drake Stadium in Des Moines Thursday-Saturday, May 17-19. The Indian track boys had five team members qualify in three events among this season’s Class 2A track and field elite.

A pair of field event efforts accounted for the Indian track boys’ Thursday efforts at the season grand finale, each ending up short of qualification for the eight-competitor final rounds of their respective competitions. Senior Isaiah Welch’s return to the State Meet in the long jump yielded a best effort of 19’8.5” that left him short of the eight-jumper finals and in 14th place in the Class 2A 24-jumper field. Carroll Kuemper senior Miles Rupiper claimed the Class 2A long jump crown with a leap of 22’1”.

Welch returns in long jump, Sullivan debuts in shot put, 4x200 earns at-large berth for State Meet

The Waukon boys track team competed in a pair of significant meets this past week that matched the Indians up against some of their fellow conference and class colleagues, and ultimately proved to be an extension or extinction of their season. The Indians first battled to a fifth-place team finish at their Northeast Iowa Conference Meet hosted by Charles City Monday, May 7 after postponement from its original Thursday, May 3 date due to storms.

Headington automatic in shot put; 4x800 and Armstead in high jump earn at-large State Meet berths

The Waukon girls track team competed in its two most important meets of the season within four nights of one another, bringing the 2018 track season to an end for many of its team members but proving to extend that season for a small handful of Lady Indians. The track Tribe opened the week by placing sixth at the Northeast Iowa Conference Meet hosted by Charles City Monday, May 7 after that meet had been postponed from Thursday, May 3 by stormy weather.