Scotties’ Vance a star in football and rodeo
Austin (51) stands with brother Lane (75) during Southmoreland media night in August.
Austin riding at Crooked Creek during a Western Pa Youth Rodeo event.
When Southmoreland football coach Mark Adams first saw Austin Vance walk into the Scotties’ weight room several years ago, Vance, a freshman at the time, looked like anything but a football player, even at that youthful age, Adams recalls, chuckling.
As a 5-foot-8 freshman, from a physical standpoint, he looked all wrong, Adams said. Four years later, however, Vance has grown into into a 6-3, 210-pound dominant lineman, noted Adams, at both right defensive end and right offensive tackle.
“He looks like a football player and has given us stability on both sides of the ball. He waited his turn and has stepped in and has done a fantastic job. Defensively, he is long and that length causes problems for teams trying to block him. Offensively, he is quick, and with his first-step quickness, he gets off the ball fast.”
Vance played behind some great Scotties linemen — Jake Beistel and Doug Leighty, both at St. Francis University, Loretto, Pa. — and he is got his shot this year, Adams added, and with increased playing time this season Adams is certain Vance will earn all-conference honors.
“He is a quiet leader, a hard worker, and he never complains. I’ve watched him play injured, and not just because of minor bruises,” Adams noted.
Those injuries have included broken fingers, a dislocated knee, and bruised shoulders, and some, but not all necessarily football related.
When Vance isn’t on the football field or tending, with his younger brother, Lane, and younger sister, Brooke, to their cows, dairy cattle, goats, horses, and chickens on the family farm in Alverton, he is a rodeo champion competing with the Western Pennsylvania Youth Rodeo Association (WPYRA). For the 2015-2016 season, he was named Chute Dogger of the Year. (Chute Doggin’ is an event in which the contestant gets into a chute with a steer. Once the chute’s gates are opened, the contestant wrestles the steer to the ground.) In addition to chute doggin’, Vance participates in bull riding and breakaway roping.
He has traveled to Maryland, Ohio, and West Virginia to compete in bull riding events, sitting atop and being bucked, and occasionally thrown, by bulls weighing 1,300-2,000 pounds;
At bull-riding events, which he attends several times each month, Vance explained there are multiple bulls, and riders draw a name of a bull to ride. Bulls jump, kick and spin, and a rider has to remain on the bull for eight seconds. If a rider is lucky, he or she does not draw a wild bull, and teamwork is essential between rider and bull.
“”I like to consider myself a cowboy,” Vance said, adding that he has “been thrown multiple times.” But not only has Vance been injured having been thrown by bulls, he has had “a couple hookings,” having been hooked with the bull’s horns and tossed back into the air.
“I enjoy this,” Vance said, proudly. “In fact, I’m thinking about a career as a professional bull rider.” This month he will spend a weekend at the PBR (Professional Bull Rider) Academy in Bowie, Texas.
As he was taking home Chute Doggin’ honors at Crooked Creek Horse Park in Ford City, Pa., in June, he was also named Reserve Champion Boys Breakaway Roper.
Locally, at the Fayette County Fair in 2012, 2013 and 2014, his 4-H background and work earned him 4-H champion dairy showman and supreme champion honors. He also was named Supreme Champion in the Dairy Cow category at both the Fayette and Westmoreland County fairs in 2011.
On the football field, Austin Vance is joined by younger brother, Lane, a 5-10. 285-pound sophomore offensive lineman and nose guard.
“Lane is strong, a hard worker, and still learning the game,” Adams said. “You never hear from them, and the brothers are all business on the field. They go against each other in practice and push each other and at times it gets chippy between them.”
“Our day begins at 6 a.m.,” Lane Vance said. “We feed our animals before school and our day ends at 9 p.m., when it’s time for another feeding, then we clean up after the animals.”
While Lane Vance has not followed his older brother into the rodeo arena, he is active in Fayette County 4-H programs with dairy cows, dairy goats and market swine. He has earned county fair Supreme Champion Dairy Cow honors three times and has had champion dairy goats, and a division champion with his market hog.
Described by his mother, Kelly, as a “home body who holds down the fort,” Lane operates a small business, selling goats milk, cheese and eggs from the farm.
Following in the footsteps, so to speak, of her older brothers, Brooke Vance, a freshman, is active in both arenas, with rodeo activities and 4-H programs on her agenda.
Brooke was a rodeo finals champion this year and Reserve champion in goat tying. She also received reserve champion honors for straight barrels this season. She competes with the Western Pennsylvania Youth Rodeo Association and with the Fayette County 4-H clubs, where she has worked with champion dairy cows.
While big brother Vance is the bull-rider in the family, Brooke has been recognized for her horsemanship activities, participating in such events as barrels, poles, goat tying and breakaway (calf) roping.
“I take care of my horses every day,” Brooke Vance said, proudly. “I ride them, feed them, take care of their hooves and teeth and keep them in top condition.”
She rides a different horse, including Dash, Jessee and Jump Start for each event. She is aboard Chic for barrel racing, her favorite event, in which contestants are timed as they weave in and out of a series of barrels.
While Austin, Lane and Brooke, the children of Adam and Kelly Vance, spend considerable hours daily with their chores and 4-H and rodeo activities, they do not neglect their academics, where each is an A/B student at Southmoreland.