Caden Dial, a senior at Dakota Valley High School, competed in the Technical Drafting competition at the South Dakota SkillsUSA State Conference out in Rapid City this past week. The competition was held at Western Dakota Tech. Dial has won this competition now for two years. By winning this competition, Dial will be headed to the national championships in Atlanta this summer. Technical Drafting is a competition where competitors are given a model and have to replicate it within a drafting software. Dial uses Inventor which is a 3D mechanical drafting software. He created the model, and then imported that into a drawing with all appropriate dimensions and tolerances.

It was back-to-back away games for the Dakota Valley baseball team on April 17 and 18 which meant it was back-toback victories for the Panthers. Versus Elk Point-Jefferson, DV had their closest contest of the season to come out ahead 2-1. The next night at Canton, they downed the C-Hawks 10-3.

It was a beautiful day on Monday, April 17 for the Canton track meet. The weather was great and what made it even more perfect was all of the personal records achieved by the Panther athletes. The title of champions of the Canton meet went to the DV boys and the girls achieved runner-up.

The Panther girls golf team took on the Elk-Point Jefferson Huskies and a couple of golfers from Flandreau for a dual meet on Tuesday, April 18. Overall team scoring had Dakota Valley as the big winners on the day. Many individuals also placed high with stellar scores.

It was an exciting matchup for the Dakota Valley softball team as they took their undefeated record up against the Lady Bulldogs from Madison on Monday, April 17. It was a home contest that had many on the edge of their seats as the game was scoreless until the 3rd inning.

Isaac Bruns, of Wynstone in Jefferson, SD, is having an incredible senior year of high school. This past March he helped lead the Dakota Valley varsity boys basketball team to back-to-back state championships and two consecutive undefeated seasons. While these feats alone are memorable and amazing, Bruns also recently received an honor never held before by a DV student athlete. He was named the 2022-23 Gatorade Player of the Year from South Dakota for basketball.

Caden Dial of North Sioux City RoboKodas 77000X was awarded the Think Award at the 2023 CREATE US Open Robotic Championship. The RoboKodas competed among 165 top VEX Robotics teams in the world. The judges praised the RoboKodas stating 77000X had “amazing amounts of research and development on theor y of robot control. Their approach to Bezier drive cur ve calculations was unique and impressive.” Dial will be competing with the top 800 high school robotics teams at the VEX Robotics World Championship April 25-27 in Dallas, TX.

Underclassmen and upperclassmen all played the links well on Tuesday, April 11 to bring home a 2nd place finish for the Dakota Valley girls varsity golf team. It was their first contest of the season and it took place in Beresford at Bridges Golf Course. The Panthers were one of six teams at this event.

The talented Panther boys and girls track squad made their way across the river to Homer, NE to take top placements in a multitude of track and field events. The day was hot and extremely windy, but Dakota Valley performed well.

While Dakota Valley schools were off on Friday, April 7 for spring break the Panther softball team was hard at work in a double header versus Beresford at home. It would be two wins for DV as they took the 1st game by a score of 9-2 and were strong in the 2nd match-up to win 16-1.