This is an exciting week coming up — for Jefferson High School, Boulder, and Jefferson County.
Practice started for Panther football, volleyball and cross country on Aug. 12, and all three sports have had great turn-outs. Now comes the crush of pre-season: Teams are required to practice 10 times on 10 different days before competing with other schools, and the first games are set for next week.
Jefferson’s volleyball teams will kick off the competition with a road trip to Columbus on Aug. 25. (They’ll have to practice on Saturday to meet the pre-season threshold.) Start time for the C team is 4:00 p.m. The JV will be up 20 minutes after the C team finished, with the varsity to follow. The Panthers then host Three Forks on Tuesday, Aug. 20, and are in Manhattan for a tournament on Sept. 3.
The varsity football squad travels to Lockwood on Friday, Aug. 26, for a 6:00 p.m. start with Baker. Jefferson has not played Baker for many years, so this will be a great game to start the season. Lockwood has a very nice facility with artificial turf, and it’s about half way between the two schools, so the long travel is shared. On Friday, Sept. 2, the Panthers play their home opener against Bigfork; they travel to Whitehall the following Friday.
And the cross country teams host the first meet of the year in Boulder on Saturday, Aug. 27. The JV kids will start running at 9:00 a.m., followed by the varsity girls at 9:45 and varsity boys at 10:15. If you want to catch the action, show up at the Veterans Park area. (And while you’re there, check out the Boulder Area Chamber of Commerce’s car show in the park starting at 9 a.m. that morning.) The “hoofers” will run in Belgrade on Friday, Sept. 2, and in Bozeman on Sept. 10.
Boulder’s biggest weekend is Aug. 25-28, when the Jefferson County Fair and Rodeo provide fun and exciting action for young and old. The In-County rodeo is Thursday, Aug. 25, and the Northern Rodeo Association pro rodeo plays out that Friday and Saturday at the fairgrounds arena. And the kids rodeo starts at noon on Thursday.
Parades, good food, dances, auctions make this a very fun week in Boulder. And please support the local businesses; it will be a big weekend for them, too.
