Football season has begun with the Rangers scoring big against Stanley County. Hill City beat the Buffaloes by a decisive 48-6 margin.
Head coach Brett Eckert said the Rangers were “able to jump out early, which gave us a lot of momentum” and said his boys “played a solid game against a good football team.”
The 2024-25 season finds the Rangers returning to nine-man play, which Eckert says is an “adventure.”
Eckert said although the game is fundamentally the same it is “a lot faster because of the amount of open space” on the field.
It was an offensive explosion last Friday evening at the Custer High School soccer team’s season-opening match against the visiting Rapid City Christian Comets, as the team’s combined for eight goals in a 5-3 Comet win, which was also the first game in that program’s history.
“Overall, compared to last year’s first game, I thought it was improvement,” Custer head coach Hannah Rehmeier said. “I think with our new formation we need a little more practice. We need some practice on where each position should be working in through the midfield better than we did Friday.”
The Custer High School golf team couldn’t have asked for a much better start to the season than the one it had Monday at Boulder Canyon Country Club outside of Sturgis, as the Wildcats had four golfers in the top 10 on the way to a first-place finish at the Sturgis Invitational.
“We played well, but neeed to keep maturing on the golf course,” head coach Paul Kelley said. “Golf is a marathon, not a sprint, so when bad things happen, we need to move onto the next shot. I’m proud of the boys, but we can still improve.”
Depth and experience are the name of the game for the Custer High School golf team as it opened its fall campaign Monday in Sturgis, with 18 Wildcat golfers to start the season, six of which have played in the state tournament in their careers. In fact, the Wildcats didn’t lose a single golfer to graduation from last year’s 13th-place team at state.
“A lot of these kids have played not just four years, but five or six years,” Custer head coach Paul Kelley said. “They have been through the whole grind of what golf is. They should be able to represent us quite well this year.”
Custer School District activities director Joey Kortermeyer delivered some disappointing news at the Aug. 14 meeting of the Custer School Board of Education: Custer will not have a competition cheer team this year.
That’s due to difficulties in filling the open coaching position after Trenna Cooper stepped down last year. Kortermeyer said that the position is a difficult one to fill as it requires a specific set of knowledge and skills. There were some applicants for the coaching role, but they also sought teaching positions that the district simply couldn’t offer.
It’s been three years since soccer was reinstated as a sport at Custer High School. Last season the Wildcats took the next step in the progression of the program, getting back in the win column and qualifying for the playoffs.
This year, the team hopes for even more.
Eighteen Wildcats took to the pitch when practice began last week, and a strong mix of young newcomers and established veterans has head coach Hannah Rehmeier excited for this fall’s season, which officially begins this Friday evening when Rapid City Christian comes to town for a 5 p.m. match.
Bull riding takes grit, perseverance, and a can-do attitude to make it to eight seconds. For the 20-year-old cowboy from Custer, Jestyn Woodward’s abilities were put to the test after recovering from his most recent injury.
In February at the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo, Woodward suffered from an injury resulting in him being carried out of the arena by Justin Sports Medicine and questioning his ability to ride again.
The Hill City School District has yet another award-winning coach. Brady Chase was recently named the 2024 Area 4A Junior High/Middle School Track and Field Assistant Coach of the Year by the South Dakota Cross Country and Track and Field Coaches Association.
Chase ran cross country and track all four years in high school and his freshman year of college.
“I was always in all sports,” said Chase. “It was just time to hang out with your friends, and I got lucky enough to find success in it.”
