CHADRON, Neb. – As usual, the Chadron State College rodeo will kick off the college rodeo schedule in the Central Rocky Mountain Region this Friday, Saturday and Sunday (September 11-13) at the Dawes County Fairgrounds in Chadron.
The primary performances will be at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday evenings, followed by the championship go-round at 10 a.m. Sunday, featuring the top 10 contestants in each of the nine events from the earlier sessions.
Tickets for the performances will be $10 per person, but youths 12 and under will be admitted without charge. They can be purchased online at chadroneagles.com/tickets, the links above in the article, or on site at the fairgrounds. A weekend pass that provides entry to all three days of the rodeo is also for sale for $25.
Because so many cowboys and cowgirls will be competing, there also will be two sessions of slack that are open to the public without charge. They will begin at 1 p.m. Friday and 8 a.m. Saturday. It's expected there will be more than 400 entries from a dozen colleges.
This year's Chadron State team includes 30 members, evenly divided between men and women. Lane Day, a former CSC cowboy now in his fifth year as the rodeo coach, believes this year's team has excellent potential, with a mix of returning veterans, two transfers who have been College National Finals Rodeo qualifiers and some promising freshmen.
Three cowboys on the roster—Sid Miller of Merna, Neb., Layne Palmer of Kadoka, S.D., and Pepper Rhyne of Craig, Colo.,—are seniors who have placed in either tie down roping, team roping or both at regional rodeos the past two years. Senior cowgirls such as Morgan Rosander of Wolbach, Neb., and Amada Sellin of Norfolk also have been competitive in barrel racing and breakaway roping.
The transfers who have competed at the CNFR in Casper include Olivia Lay, a Texas native who has earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Wyoming. Lay is now a graduate student at CSC and will help coach the team while also competing at the rodeos. Day said Lay is probably as good a team roping heeler as he has ever seen, men or women.
Jess Harper, a Faith, S.D., cowboy who has transferred from Gillette College for his senior year at CSC, is also a team roping heeler and has qualified for the college finals in that event each of the last three years. He will join his brother, Drew, who remains at Gillette, in the event in the regional rodeos again this year, Day said. They led the region in the event last season.
The Chadron State coach said this year's team also has a pair of promising sophomore bronc riders. Levi Noyes was the Montana High School Rodeo saddle bronc rider winner when he was a senior at Hardin High in 2025 and Leighton Sander of Custer, S.D., is a rapidly improving bareback rider "who refuses to be bucked off," in Day's words.
Unfortunately, CSC will not be at full strength in the bareback riding this weekend because junior Tanner Olson of Gordon, who has placed in his event at the last two CSC rodeos, is still recovering from injuries he received late last spring. Olson anticipates he'll be able to ride again during the second half of this season.
Day also said several freshmen have joined the team after having successful high school rodeo careers and could be competitive at the college level immediately.
The rough stock for this year's CSC rodeo will again be supplied by Muddy Creek Pro Rodeo at Scenic, S.D., while Mill Iron Spear and Graff Land and Cattle Co. are bringing the timed events livestock.
Sugar Rey Quinn of Rapid City will again be the rodeo announcer. Former CSC bareback rider Rowdy Moon will be the bullfighter and two more ex-CSC contestants, Justin Kissack and Colton Storer, will be the pickup men for the bronc riding.
Cowboy and Cowgirl Church that is open to the public will begin at 8 a.m. Sunday in the fairgrounds grandstand preceding the rodeo finals.
