Sports

The Kee volleyball team continued in search of its first win at home this season, suffering a fate similar to its home opener just a week earlier by falling to West Central at home in three sets in an Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) match Tuesday, September 29. The Hawks got progressively stronger as the match went on, but not quite strong enough to fend off the match sweep. The Kee netters were dealt a 10-25 loss in set one before edging closer in a 17-25 loss in set two and then having the final set snatched away in comeback fashion by the visiting Blue Devils for a match-ending 21-25 Kee defeat.

The Waukon volleyball team remained in search of its first win in the Northeast Iowa Conference (NEIC) this past week, getting a double-dose of NEIC action on back-to-back nights to start last week. Although both of those matches ultimately ended up shy of the win column, they did so to differing degrees, the Indians first battling back and forth at home against New Hampton Monday, September 28 before falling in a full five sets but then having to travel to Class 4A sixth-rated Waverly-Shell Rock the very next night, Tuesday, September 29, and returning home with a loss in three straight sets to the Go-Hawk squad that has played more than three times as many matches as the Tribe this season and won more than twice as many as the Indians have even played in total.

A happy Homecoming slipped away from the Kee football team in the late minutes of their Friday, October 2 hosting of Springville for that annual celebration.

Facing a high-powered Oriole squad that ranks near the top-five among Eight-Player teams in scoring this season with a scoring average of just over 60 points per games, the Hawks were faced with the task of stopping - or at least matching - that firepower. Through three-and-a-half quarters of play, Kee’s gridders did just that - even fighting back from a 30-8 third quarter deficit, but Springville’s offense combined with some Kee misfortune denied any further comeback and resulted in the 50-30 Hawk defeat.

The Waukon boys cross country team hosted its own home invitational Tuesday, September 22, welcoming 10 other teams. Just eight of the meet’s 11 teams were able to compile team scores, the Indians finishing in the middle of that eight-team pack with 106 team points.

The Indians are next scheduled to compete Saturday, October 3 at the Crestwood Invitational. They will then wrap up their regular season at South Winneshiek Tuesday, October 6 before competing at the Northeast Iowa Conference Meet in Cresco October 13.

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The Waukon girls cross country team hosted nine other teams for its home invitational Tuesday, September 22, with nine out of those 10 teams scoring points at the meet. The Lady Indians were fairly generous hosts, running to a seventh-place finish in that nine-team field with 135 team points, just one point behind a fellow Allamakee County distance squad, Kee.

The Indians are next scheduled to compete Saturday, October 3 at the Crestwood Invitational. The distance Tribe will then wrap up its invitational season at South Winneshiek Thursday, October 6 before the Northeast Iowa Conference Meet Tuesday, October 13.

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The Kee volleyball team finally got to open its 2020 home schedule, hosting Central Elkader Tuesday, September 22 in an Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) battle. That match-up ended up full in favor of the visiting Warriors in three straight sets, the Hawks falling by scores of 16-25, 22-25 and 18-25 to slip to a 1-2 record in Upper Iowa Conference play as part of an overall 2-4 season mark.
The match statistics were nearly as close as the final match scores, with those statistics also falling mostly in favor of Central Elkader. The Hawks pounded out nearly a match worth of points at the net with 22 kills, with the Warriors managing eight more net winners but also giving up 15 points on misfires in comparison to just 11 hitting errors by the Hawks.

Anyone who saw the first 30 seconds of the Kee football team’s Friday, September 25 road game at North Iowa in Buffalo Center would likely not have guessed it would go down to the final 30 seconds before being decided in the Hawks’ favor. North Iowa fans may still not believe it.

“Wow! That was quite the high school football game,” Kee football coach Chad Winters said. “It wasn’t the cleanest played game, but the fans sure got their money’s worth. We couldn’t have had a worse start than we did. We were down 12-0 just 23 seconds into the game after two big plays by them and a turnover by us. To the boys’ credit, they battled back.”

Indians’ game this Friday canceled due to continued COVID-19 concerns at Independence

For most teams, opening a game with 10 plays and finding the end zone would be considered a pretty good opening possession. But for the Waukon football team, after running just 10 plays of offense in their Friday, September 18 Homecoming game against Oelwein, they had already built a 50-0 advantage over the visiting Huskies.

Coming off its first loss of the 2020 football season, the Kee football team was looking to get back on track when the Hawks traveled to Central City Friday, September 18. Facing a Wildcat team that has yet to win a game and has been outscored by a 219-14 result, including a pair of scoreless losses to this season’s Eight-Player District 3 top-10 ranked leaders, the Hawks continued that trend with a 30-0 road triumph.

As convincing as that Hawk win seemed to be, it did take some time to develop. The two teams slugged out just a 6-0 Kee halftime lead, but Hawk football coach Chad Winters said some changes made at the game’s midpoint break proved to be effective, as the Hawks put together a 24-0 outscoring of the host Wildcats to pull away to their shut-out victory.

The Kee girls and boys cross country teams competed in their busiest week of the season this past week, participating in a pair of invitational meets. The Hawks first took part in the Starmont Invitational Tuesday, September 15 after adding it to their schedule following two other meet cancellations earlier in the season. The Kee distance crew then ran at the Central Elkader Invitational Thursday, September 17. The Lady Hawks brought home an eighth-place finish at Starmont and finished fourth at the Central Elkader Invitational, with the Kee boys not having enough runners to compile a team score at either meet.

The Hawks were next scheduled to compete at the Waukon Invitational Tuesday, September 22. They will then take part in the Jesup Invitational Tuesday, September 29.

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