LEVELLAND—The South Plains College men's and women's rodeo teams will be back on the road this weekend as they travel to Vernon, TX for the Vernon College Rodeo beginning at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 28.
The Lady Texans will look for a repeat performance after winning the women's all-around team title last weekend in Portales at the Eastern New Mexico University Rodeo with 255 points, 60 points ahead of second-place finisher Tarleton State University.
Sophomore Jenna Dallyn won the women's all-around title with a sixth-place finish in the breakaway roping event and a ninth-place finish in the goat tying event. Teammate Alex Odle won the barrel racing event, picking up 175 points in the process to help the Lady Texans gain an early lead in the regional standings after week one. Odle ran a 17.41 in the long round followed by a short run of 17.80 to finish with an average time of 35.21.
"Anytime you can leave with a win, it kind of gives us a little jumpstart on some of the four-year schools," South Plains head coach Kerry Doster said. "Obviously, any kind of advantage we can get this early is a good thing for us."
The Texans will look to build on a week one performance that saw two Texans advance to Saturday's short round in the tiedown roping and team roping events. Zack Kirkpatrick ran the seventh fastest time in the long round of the tiedown roping event with a 10.5 and finished the weekend with a ninth place overall finish.
South Plains' Cody Huwa paired with Taylor Schmidt of Weatherford College in the team roping event as the duo ran the fourth fastest time in the long round with a 6.9 and ended the weekend with an eighth-place finish.
"Zack had a pretty good weekend in the calf roping, but unfortunately in the short round he had a chance to place but his calf just wouldn't get up out of the mud," Doster said. "Cody was fourth in the first round in team roping with his partner and unfortunately missed in the short round, but with the rain and everything else, it was pretty challenging for everyone there."
The full schedule of events for this weekend's rodeo can be found at the following link: http://nebula.wsimg.com/c4edc82c93be387e855fa1357a512ecb?AccessKeyId=74F232E83CADD3B9071D&disposition=0&alloworigin=1
South Plains head coach Kerry Doster spoke with Michael Wiiest of KLVT radio in Levelland to preview this weekend's events, which can be seen in the video below: