By: Ruth Nicolaus
With the addition of the women’s breakaway roping to the North Platte pro rodeo in 2020, cowgirls who don’t barrel race have another event they can enter.
Among the more than 400 contestants entered at the North Platte rodeo this weekend, 54 of them are breakaway ropers, and twelve of them are Nebraska cowgirls.
Katie Dent, Mullen, is one of those Nebraska women. When she graduated high school in 2002, she chose to play basketball at Hastings College, where she was on the national championship teams her freshman and senior years.
Breakaway roping has been an event in high school and college rodeo for years, but about three years ago, it began to be added to pro rodeos across the country.
And as it’s opened more doors for cowgirls to compete professionally, the amount of money to be won by cowgirl ropers has increased dramatically. Like their counterparts in the barrel racing and the men’s events, breakaway ropers can make a living going down the rodeo road.
If professional breakaway roping had been around when Dent got out of college, “it would have been a much bigger consideration,” she said. “There wasn’t any option for it, beyond college, as a professional career.”
Dent’s brother is retired bareback rider Steven Dent, a ten-time Wrangler National Finals Rodeo qualifier and three-time reserve world champion. He was a standout football player and wrestler for Mullen High School.
“I remember Steven trying to make that decision,” she said. “He asked himself, ‘am I going to play football (collegiately) or rodeo?’ Finally he said, I can make a pro career in rodeo. I didn’t have that opportunity. It wasn’t even an option.”
Chadron’s Brandy Schaack will rope in North Platte. The Hyannis native teaches third grade and rodeos in the Badlands Circuit, the rodeos in North and South Dakota.
A 2013 and 2014 state high school champion breakaway roper and 2021 collegiate regional champ, this will be her third time to compete in North Platte.
She’ll compete at between forty and fifty rodeos this year, counting both pro rodeos and the regional associations.
She loves that the breakaway roping is growing. “It’s crazy, to me, how far it’s come,” she said. “It’s really cool to see it added to more places, with equal (added) money. There’s so much money out there to be won, it’s insane.”
Schaack travels with Danielle Wray, another breakaway roper, from Ord.
A 2020 graduate of Mid-Plains Community College, Wray won the state high school breakaway title in 2018 and the 2019 and 2020 collegiate regional team roping titles.
She and her dad, Mark, raise and train AQHA performance horses; her sister Makayla just finished her senior year as fourth in the state in the breakaway roping at the state high school finals rodeo, held in Burwell last weekend.
Adding breakaway roping to pro rodeos “has opened many doors. Five years ago, after college, you had one option: amateur rodeos. Now you have options. You can go to the circuit finals, you can try to make the National Finals Breakaway Roping. We have places to go now.”
Her sister Makayla has choices that Danielle, even five years ago, didn’t have. “My sister is a senior in high school this year. She talks about getting her (Women’s Pro Rodeo Association) permit next year, and that was something I never thought about because it wasn’t a choice.”
Dent has a daughter, Abbigail, age nine, who, just this spring, roped her first calf while on horseback. “That really fed the fire (for her),” Dent said.
Abbigail is a dozen years away from pro rodeo, but Dent is glad that breakaway roping could be a possibility for her.
“How great is it, that my daughter can make that choice. Maybe she won’t want to do that at all, but I’m really excited about the opportunities for everybody.”
The Buffalo Bill Rodeo takes place this week, June 14-17, at the Wild West Arena in North Platte. Breakaway roping is one of eight events at the rodeo, including bareback riding, steer wrestling, tie-down roping, saddle bronc riding, team roping, barrel racing, and bull riding.
Performances begin at 8 pm. Slack, the extra competition, takes place at 8 am on June 14-15. Slack is free and open to the public.
Rodeo tickets range in price from $11-$24 and are available online at NebraskalandDays.com, at the Wild West Arena office (2400 North Buffalo Bill Ave.) and at the gate.
For more information and a complete schedule of NebraskalandDays events, visit the website or call the office at 308.532.7939.