Sports

The Kee volleyball team got its 2015 season underway across the river in De Soto, WI and returned with a split of its first two matches of its fall campaign Thursday, August 27. The Lady Hawks won three of four sets to defeat the host school, 25-22, 25-17, 19-25 and 25-4, but fell to the other Wisconsin school competing, Seneca, in a full five sets by scores of 17-25, 21-25, 25-22, 29-27 and 12-15. Seneca also went on to sweep De Soto in three straight sets in their match. The Hawks have had a week to prepare for their first home matches of the season, hosting both Turkey Valley and New Hampton in a double-dual this Thursday, September 3. Kee will then have another week of preparation prior to its Thursday, September 10 home match with South Winneshiek.

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The Kee cross country team got its 2015 season underway at the Edgewood-Colesburg Invitational Tuesday, August 25. The Hawk boys scored 191 team points to place seventh in the meet’s seven-team field, with the Lady Hawks having just a single runner competing, sophomore Nicki Wood finishing 16th out of 40 runners in the 5K girls race with a time of 23:33.
The Hawks will next compete at the MFL/MarMac Invitational Thursday, September 3. Two meets await the Kee distance dandies the following week, at Clayton Ridge Tuesday, September 8 and at North Fayette Valley Saturday, September 12.

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The Waukon girls cross country team will return enough varsity letterwinning experience in 2015, five runners, to field a team score, but will face the challenge of combining those veteran returnees with a larger group of underclassmen to move those team scorers up into a more competitive position this season. Adding to that challenge will be the transition to a five kilometer (5K) distance for Iowa high school girls this season, up from the 4K distance from previous years.
“It is going to take a few races to get the girls adjusted to the 5k distance,” second-year Waukon girls cross country coach Brett Egan said. “The girls will need to have some patience as they get comfortable with the change. There was a handful of girls who decided to put in some substantial summer mileage, and I see that paying off for them early. With the transition to a 5k this fall, the strength gained from summer mileage is going to pay off in the long run.”

The past 10 months could not pass by quickly enough for the Waukon boys cross country team, as all eight of last season’s top runners return from the Indians’ State-qualifying team that placed 14th among Class 2A’s elite teams last fall. That first State Meet qualification for the Tribe in more than a half decade produced by a collection of juniors and sophomores who are eligible to return this season has caught the anticipative eye of others as well, resulting in as high as a top-five ranking for the Tribe among Class 2A teams to begin this 2015 campaign.
Those veteran returnees include a group of five seniors, Brock Berns, Isaac Fink, Kameron Klinge, Tanner Manning and T.J. Treptau, and the junior trio of Austin Day, Hunter Jensen and Tyler O’Neill. That crew makes up just over half of this season’s total of 15 competitors for the Indians.

The Kee cross country program will see a new face at the coaching helm for the first time in four decades, but a familiar face to most Kee High School student athletes. After veteran coach Gary Bottorff retired following completion of the 2014 cross country season, fellow veteran and multi-sport coach Pat Wagner has taken the reins of the Kee distance running program, bringing with him an abundance of coaching experience in a number of different sports.

The 2015 Kee football team will look to benefit from the return of half a dozen varsity letterwinners coming back from a team that posted a 6-3 record last season and qualified for the Eight-Player State Play-Offs for the sixth consecutive season. Those six veterans will shoulder a heavy load, however, as last season’s squad graduated eight seniors, many of whom were multi-year starters and letterwinners.
Those half dozen returning letterwinners include a trio of seniors in Logan Flack, Jed McLimans and Ethan Walleser. Juniors Clay Olson and Casey Carroll also bring back a great deal of varsity experience from their young high school football careers, while sophomore Brock Flack wraps up this season’s list of seasoned returnees for the Hawks out of 23 total players on this season’s Kee roster.

The 2015 Kee volleyball team has a lot to look forward to this fall; a lot of height, a lot of returning varsity experience, and a lot of hope for a successful fall campaign. A whopping total of 10 varsity letterwinners return for the volleyball Hawks, including every one of their statistical leaders from last season from a squad that finished with a 12-17 overall record and a 5-4 mark that placed Kee in the middle of the final Upper Iowa Conference standings.
“I believe our biggest strength will be the fact we have so many returning letterwinners and experience,” Kee volleyball coach Rich Ellis said. “Last season we had three freshmen in the line-up, and those girls have a year of varsity volleyball under their belt now. Combine that with our returning seniors and it should lead to a successful season. We will be counting on our seniors to really supply the leadership we are going to need to be successful.”

The misfortune of the 2014 Waukon football season could very well play into a strong advantage for the 2015 Indian grid campaign, as season-ending injuries suffered by a small handful of team-leading seniors early last fall opened the door for several underclassmen to gain experience that will be most beneficial for the football Tribe this season. A total of 16 varsity letterwinners return for the Indians, with half of those veterans playing a majority of snaps on both sides of the football last season during the Tribe’s 3-6 overall campaign that was just a handful of plays away from a third consecutive State Play-Off berth.

The Waukon volleyball team will return just three varsity letterwinners from last season, graduating nine seniors from a squad that posted a 16-22 record last season. Although that senior class was one of the largest in recent memory, third-year Waukon volleyball head coach Peyton Lapel will be welcoming an even larger group of upperclassmen this year, as 11 seniors have reported for early-season practice thus far.

by Val Meyer