Neither man qualified for the Cinch Playoffs Governor’s Cup in Sioux Falls, S.D. The field is below.
The rest of Mandan
Mandan paid 15 holes on $60,000 added. Nelson Wyatt and Jonathan Torres split second with Clay Smith and Coleby Payne at 4.0 for $8,213 each — Wyatt’s and Torres’ first checks since Filer on Sept. 5. Derrick Begay and Colter Todd were fourth for $6,571, which moved Todd to No. 16 heeling. Cory Kidd V and Carson Johnson were fifth for $5,914, which moved Kidd to No. 20 heading. Cody Snow and Lane Mitchell split sixth through eighth with Korbin Rice/Cooper Freeman and Tyler Tryan/Nicky Northcott. Brenten Hall and Wyatt Cox were ninth for $3,285.
Clint Summers and Jade Corkill, Coy Rahlmann and Logan Medlin, and Brye Crites and Ross Ashford all no-timed. For Summers, Rahlmann, Medlin and Corkill, it cost them position on the bubble; all four are now outside with one week left.
The heading line
Above them: Kaleb Driggers $206,553, Korbin Rice $181,148, Tyler Tryan $154,981, Tanner Tomlinson $146,460, Lightning Aguilera $141,689, James Arviso $140,165, Jake Smith $134,867.
Four men — Graham, Wyatt, Hall and Summers — are inside $1,210 for the last heading spot. Rahlmann is $2,172 back. Kidd is $7,069 back and is the only one of them besides Graham going to Sioux Falls.
The heeling line
Above them: Junior Nogueira $206,553, Cooper Freeman $181,148, Nicky Northcott $156,332, Levi Lord $141,350, Coleby Payne $136,724, Kaden Profili $133,065, Lane Mitchell $125,128.
The rest of the week
Pendleton paid $10,769 a man to win its average. Smith and Payne won it, taking $12,500 a man with the short round; Payne went from No. 14 to No. 6. Begay and Todd left with $17,371 a man across three payouts, the largest single-rodeo haul of anyone on either bubble this year.
Albuquerque added $2,664 a man for Begay and Todd and $2,131 for Smith and Payne. Abilene paid Snow and Mitchell $2,244 for fifth. St. George paid Begay and Todd $1,410 for fifth. Othello, Wash., paid Trey Yates $1,691 for third with Riley Kittle.
Since Sept. 6, Begay has gone from No. 16 to No. 9, Payne from No. 14 to No. 5, and Wesley Thorp from No. 25 to No. 17. Todd has won $28,015 since Sept. 15.
What’s left
Fourteen rodeos remain, with $263,417 in added money per side — though 63 percent of that is one rodeo that requires qualification.
Pasadena, Texas, which began Sept. 20, adds $6,500 per side. Added money excludes entry fees; actual payouts at the larger rodeos will run well above these figures.
Open to anyone with a PRCA card: $96,750 per side across 13 rodeos, with the Last Hoorah and San Bernardino accounting for 60 percent of it. There are two rodeos in Stephenville that week, and the final weekend collides — Sioux Falls, San Bernardino, Poway and Mona all run Sept. 25-27.
The last day
The Last Hoorah pays three rounds, an aggregate and a short round, with 90 teams entered. Per man:
A perfect day is $22,203.90 a man.
At those numbers, Wyatt could take the last heading spot with an eighth-place aggregate check, Hall and Summers with a seventh, Rahlmann with a sixth. On the heeling side, Todd needs fourth in the aggregate and Thorp needs second; Medlin and Corkill need more than the aggregate win. That’s one rodeo. It isn’t the only one.
What nobody can see
Contestants are capped at 80 counting rodeos, and how many any man has used is not public. Two ropers sitting $517 apart can be in completely different positions depending on how many rodeos each has left.
Where the cut lands
TRJ projects the cut at about $119,500 heading and $123,500 heeling, based on how much the No. 15 line climbed over the same stretch in 2025, applied to where it sits now, plus an allowance for the Last Hoorah. Ranges: $117,000-122,000 heading, $121,000-126,000 heeling.
The lines sit below those numbers today because the cutline doesn’t rise when the No. 15 man wins — it rises when the men behind him pass him. Last week Egusquiza, Flake, Begay and Payne all cleared the line and it barely moved, because the men still below it hadn’t cashed. This week they will.
Sioux Falls
The Governor’s Cup takes the four Puyallup finalists plus the next eight headers and heelers in the final Playoff Series standings after the Sept. 21 cutoff. It adds $166,667 a side. Qualifiers can rope only with another qualifier, so three teams are new. The field, according to Kaleb Driggers, the PRCA’s team roping contestant director:
- Kaleb Driggers/Junior Nogueira
- James Arviso/Levi Lord
- Luke Brown/Hunter Koch
- Garrett Tonozzi/Trey Yates
- Tyler Tryan/Nicky Northcott
- Andrew Ward/Jake Long
- Cody Snow/Lane Mitchell
- Cory Kidd V/Carson Johnson
- Dawson Graham/Dillon Graham
- Tanner Tomlinson/Coleby Payne (new)
- Derrick Begay/Douglas Rich (new)
- Lightning Aguilera/Ross Ashford (new)
Dawson Graham took the last heading spot by 3.67 points over Jake Smith. Crites missed by 3.92 and Todd missed the last heeling spot by 12. Both No. 15s are in. Wyatt, Hall, Summers, Rahlmann, Kelton, Todd and Thorp are not.
Standings are unofficial. They start with the PRCA’s current official standings, which run through Sept. 14, and add posted payouts from rodeos that ended Sept. 15-20. Added money from PRCA Business Journal listings, published Sept. 18.
An earlier version of this story omitted Colter Todd and Cory Kidd V from the standings tables and listed Clay Smith at $113,841.Standings are PRCA figures current to Sept. 8 plus official money since. Added money from PRCA Business Journal listings, published Sept. 18. Unofficial.
