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Trent Creager wins tie-down roping in Omaha

OMAHA, NE – Tie-down roper Trent Creager didn’t check the standings before he arrived at the Qwest Center for the $750,000 Justin Boots Championships. He knew roughly where he was and that he needed “to win a little more money” to qualify for his first Wrangler National Finals Rodeo. That’s all he figured he needed to know.

Fair enough. If you are going to win the rodeo and $23,195 in two days, you probably don’t need to sweat the details.

Creager was still 17th and out of the field for the Dec. 2-11 Wrangler NFR as of Friday night’s second round. His tie for fourth place allowed him to earn an additional fifth-place check in the average, and that $3,784 parlay pushed him past Hunter Herrin and Houston Hutto into the Top 15. But not by much.



“(ProRodeo Hall of Fame roper) Roy Cooper told me I was in,” Creager said. “He’d been doing some figuring and said I had enough won to make it stand up. It helped me relax a little, but I told him, ‘Let me win a couple more thousand to be sure.'”

What he did was max out his potential earnings. Creager won the semifinals in 7.5 seconds Saturday night in front of a crowd of 10,026, and then came right back to win the finals in 7.7 seconds to bank a whopping $20,291. With career-best earnings of $92,092, he has jumped all the way to sixth place in the world standings.



“I’ve roped in a lot of situations,” Creager said, “and I don’t tend to get real nervous. It’s kind of the calm before the storm. I get off by myself and just think about what I have to do. The main thing with me is getting the right start. If I can get the timing right on that, everything else seems to fall in line.

“I really would have liked to have had the Finals made before coming here, but there’s really no better way to make it than when it’s all on the line. I’d finished in the top 20 before a few times, but I didn’t really think about it that much this year. For some reason this year, I felt like I was going to go (to Las Vegas). Rodeoing with Clint (Cooper) this year was great, because he always believed in me. It’s been a great year.”

Clay Tryan and Travis Graves completed a nearly flawless weekend of team roping with a 4.6-second run in the finals to get the win over Travis Tryan (Clay’s younger brother) and seven-time World Champion heeler Rich Skelton. Tryan and Graves won three of four rounds in Omaha – finishing second in the other – to earn a rodeo-best $35,955 apiece, take over first place in the world standings and also make a little history.

Graves had broken the regular-season record for money earned by a heeler on Friday and pushed the record all the way to $147,654 by the end of Saturday night. Tryan pushed past Chad Masters’ year-old record for regular-season earnings by a header Saturday with $145,524.

“Travis and I talked about that we needed some big-money checks, and we got them at the final two rodeos (they also won the Justin Boots Playoffs two weeks ago in Puyallup, WA),” Tryan said. “Our goal was to win $140,000, but we kind of fell off the pace and didn’t think we would get it. We just hit the right spots at the end. It feels pretty good.”

Utah’s Steve Woolsey and Wesley Silcox dominated the bull riding competition all weekend. Both men rode all four of their bulls and earned more than $30,000, but in end, the edge went to Woolsey, of Payson. His 93-point ride on 4L and Diamond S Rodeo’s Big Iron in the finals got him the win and the $13,251 finals check.

The score was just one point shy of the arena record set by Jesse Bail in 2003.

“Anytime you can win in Omaha it’s outstanding,” Woolsey said. “It’s big money and big fans.”

Silcox moved past Shawn Hogg into first place in the world standings and Woolsey’s win lifted him from 10th to third in the world standings.

Texan Bradley Harter was more relieved than excited to have won the finals of the saddle bronc riding after having made it through with a 49-point ride in the semifinals.

“My first run was embarrassing as all get out,” Harter said, “but I guess that’s not what matters. In the eight-round, I had a horse that really wasn’t that good to ride…but in the four-round, I had a horse I’ve had before, (Barnes Pro Rodeo’s) Cat Power, and I’ve won it the past two years on him…thank God I stayed on top and ended up winning it.”

Harter rode Cat Power for 80 points, and all three of the other finalists were bucked off before the eight-second horn.

Steven Dent of Mullen, NE, delighted a home-state crowd by winning the bareback riding with a 90-point ride on Beutler & Son’s Forward Motion and banked $23,009 during the weekend to cut Ryan Gray’s world standings lead nearly in half entering the Wrangler NFR.

Canada’s Curtis Cassidy stopped the clock in 3.4 seconds in the final round to take the steer wrestling and end the weekend with $25,747 in earnings. That pushed him more than $10,000 past Todd Suhn into first place in the world standings heading into Las Vegas.

OMAHA, NE – Tie-down roper Trent Creager didn’t check the standings before he arrived at the Qwest Center for the $750,000 Justin Boots Championships. He knew roughly where he was and that he needed “to win a little more money” to qualify for his first Wrangler National Finals Rodeo. That’s all he figured he needed to know.

Fair enough. If you are going to win the rodeo and $23,195 in two days, you probably don’t need to sweat the details.

Creager was still 17th and out of the field for the Dec. 2-11 Wrangler NFR as of Friday night’s second round. His tie for fourth place allowed him to earn an additional fifth-place check in the average, and that $3,784 parlay pushed him past Hunter Herrin and Houston Hutto into the Top 15. But not by much.

“(ProRodeo Hall of Fame roper) Roy Cooper told me I was in,” Creager said. “He’d been doing some figuring and said I had enough won to make it stand up. It helped me relax a little, but I told him, ‘Let me win a couple more thousand to be sure.'”

What he did was max out his potential earnings. Creager won the semifinals in 7.5 seconds Saturday night in front of a crowd of 10,026, and then came right back to win the finals in 7.7 seconds to bank a whopping $20,291. With career-best earnings of $92,092, he has jumped all the way to sixth place in the world standings.

“I’ve roped in a lot of situations,” Creager said, “and I don’t tend to get real nervous. It’s kind of the calm before the storm. I get off by myself and just think about what I have to do. The main thing with me is getting the right start. If I can get the timing right on that, everything else seems to fall in line.

“I really would have liked to have had the Finals made before coming here, but there’s really no better way to make it than when it’s all on the line. I’d finished in the top 20 before a few times, but I didn’t really think about it that much this year. For some reason this year, I felt like I was going to go (to Las Vegas). Rodeoing with Clint (Cooper) this year was great, because he always believed in me. It’s been a great year.”

Clay Tryan and Travis Graves completed a nearly flawless weekend of team roping with a 4.6-second run in the finals to get the win over Travis Tryan (Clay’s younger brother) and seven-time World Champion heeler Rich Skelton. Tryan and Graves won three of four rounds in Omaha – finishing second in the other – to earn a rodeo-best $35,955 apiece, take over first place in the world standings and also make a little history.

Graves had broken the regular-season record for money earned by a heeler on Friday and pushed the record all the way to $147,654 by the end of Saturday night. Tryan pushed past Chad Masters’ year-old record for regular-season earnings by a header Saturday with $145,524.

“Travis and I talked about that we needed some big-money checks, and we got them at the final two rodeos (they also won the Justin Boots Playoffs two weeks ago in Puyallup, WA),” Tryan said. “Our goal was to win $140,000, but we kind of fell off the pace and didn’t think we would get it. We just hit the right spots at the end. It feels pretty good.”

Utah’s Steve Woolsey and Wesley Silcox dominated the bull riding competition all weekend. Both men rode all four of their bulls and earned more than $30,000, but in end, the edge went to Woolsey, of Payson. His 93-point ride on 4L and Diamond S Rodeo’s Big Iron in the finals got him the win and the $13,251 finals check.

The score was just one point shy of the arena record set by Jesse Bail in 2003.

“Anytime you can win in Omaha it’s outstanding,” Woolsey said. “It’s big money and big fans.”

Silcox moved past Shawn Hogg into first place in the world standings and Woolsey’s win lifted him from 10th to third in the world standings.

Texan Bradley Harter was more relieved than excited to have won the finals of the saddle bronc riding after having made it through with a 49-point ride in the semifinals.

“My first run was embarrassing as all get out,” Harter said, “but I guess that’s not what matters. In the eight-round, I had a horse that really wasn’t that good to ride…but in the four-round, I had a horse I’ve had before, (Barnes Pro Rodeo’s) Cat Power, and I’ve won it the past two years on him…thank God I stayed on top and ended up winning it.”

Harter rode Cat Power for 80 points, and all three of the other finalists were bucked off before the eight-second horn.

Steven Dent of Mullen, NE, delighted a home-state crowd by winning the bareback riding with a 90-point ride on Beutler & Son’s Forward Motion and banked $23,009 during the weekend to cut Ryan Gray’s world standings lead nearly in half entering the Wrangler NFR.

Canada’s Curtis Cassidy stopped the clock in 3.4 seconds in the final round to take the steer wrestling and end the weekend with $25,747 in earnings. That pushed him more than $10,000 past Todd Suhn into first place in the world standings heading into Las Vegas.