Belgrade’s Bolich winds up with same horse he had a year ago

By JIM CNOCKAERT Chronicle Sports Editor

This year’s Dodge National Circuit Finals Rodeo proved to be déjà vu all over again for Belgrade cowboy Andy Bolich n in a couple of different ways.

BILL SCHAEFER/IDAHO STATE JOURNAL Belgrade’s Andy Bolich hangs on to Korkow’s “Anchor Bay” for a 77-point ride. He rode the same horse in the second round last year. Since moving from the Columbia River Circuit three years ago, he’s dominated Montana Circuit in the bareback riding, winning the year-end championship each year. But other than one Columbia River season when he made the short go at the nationals, he has yet to get a good draw in three tries out of Montana in the opening round at Holt Arena in Pocatello, Idaho.

This year’s rodeo was eerily similar to last year’s. In Friday’s start to the second round, he drew the same horse he had in the second round last year: Korkow’s “Anchor Bay.” He had a similarly good ride, too n scoring a 77 n but it was nowhere near enough to compensate for Thursday’s tough start.

“It was all right,” Bolich said of his ride. “That’s a nice, solid horse. If you score 80-something (points) on your first ride, that horse will get you to the short go. But it’s not one you’re going to win a round on. Still, it’s what you’ve got to work with.”

Bolich acknowledges that he’s stuck in a first-round funk when it comes to the nationals, but he also knows there isn’t anything he can do about it.

That’s because the luck of the draw is cyclical. For instances, he drew poorly in all three rounds at the 2007 Montana Circuit Finals, and barely hung on to the year-end title; this year, he drew well in all three rounds and won the average (and the year-end title) in decisive fashion.

“Draw is such a huge thing, and the first-round deal has got me right now,” he said. “Sometimes it works in your favor, and sometimes it doesn’t. There are 16 other guys who didn’t make the short round, either.”

The second round concludes Saturday afternoon, and the top eight scorers in each event advance to the evening performance, where they start from scratch. The first go-round eliminates half of that field, and the top four start from scratch again to compete for the championships.

While Bolich is out of the hunt, two rookie cowboys still have a shot at Saturday night.

Montana State junior Cort Scheer, who tied for ninth in the first round with a 77-point ride but who is just a point out of eighth place, competes this afternoon. He’ll be aboard Korkow’s Wing Clipper, a horse that provided a 77-point ride for the Montana Circuit’s Jake Costello in the first round.

“That’s a pretty nice horse,” Bolich said. “Cort’s got a good chance to get into the short go.”

Belgrade’s Cody Tew and his partner, Lolo’s Kory Mytty, were 12th in the team roping after the opening round. Their 10.6-second run left them 3.8 seconds out of eighth place.

Former MSU cowboy Jake Hayworth, an Idaho resident who competes on the Montana Circuit, put himself in a position Friday night to make the round of eight in the saddle bronc.

On Thursday night, he rode JS Rodeo’s “Red Feather” for a 78-point score n good for eighth in the average. On Friday, he had a 79-point ride on Korkow’s “Vidalia.” That was good for second in the round heading into Saturday’s matinee.

Steer wrestler K.C. Jones of Decatur, Texas, was the last alternate to get into the Dodge National Circuit Finals Rodeo, and he’s doing his level best to make sure he’s the last man standing.

Jones got into the field late Tuesday night as a replacement for Texas Circuit champion Matt Reeves and, using a horse borrowed from teammate Mickey Gee, Jones is leading the average midway through the second round with a time of 8.1 seconds.

Jones finished third in the first round at Holt Arena with a time of 4.0 seconds and backed that up with a 4.1 second run on Friday night to tie for second place behind Shawn Greenfield’s 3.7, despite injuring his left knee.

“The doctors say I have a partially torn medial collateral ligament,” Jones said, “but now that I’m through to the semifinals I’ll compete if I have to do it on one leg. They are going to fix me up with a brace to give some more support.”

Friday night’s performance was the first half of the second round and the second round will be completed Saturday afternoon.

Barrel racer Rachael Myllymaki, of Simi Valley, Calif., accounted for the first DNCFR record of this 22nd annual event, completing a run of 14.91 seconds to erase the record set by two-time world champion Sherry Cervi in 1996, by a hundredth of a second.

It was the first sub-15 second run in Myllymaki’s nine appearances at the DNCFR and had special meaning to her because she was onboard Wink, offspring of Page, the mare she rode to the DNCFR championship in 1990.

Jessy Davis of Payson, Utah, kept his hot streak going in the bareback riding. He followed up his win in the first round with the best score on Friday, an 83 point ride on Western Rodeo’s Wagon Train. He leads the average with 168 points and is qualified into Saturday night’s semifinals.

Matt Shiozawa, of neighboring Chubbock, Idaho, had an 8.1 second run in the tie-down roping to take over the average lead with a time of 17.6 seconds with the thunderous backing of the Holt Arena crowd.

Jerry Shepherd of Nephi, Utah, leads the average in the bull riding with 171 points on two head and the Wilderness is threatening to run away with the team title, having posted total prize money of $56,789 entering the event’s final day, more than double the second place Prairie Circuit.

Jim Cnockaert is at jcnockaert@dailychronicle.com and at 582-2690. The Pro Rodeo Cowboys Association contributed to this report.

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