Rodeo roundup: Tsinigine, Buhler capture Reno Rodeo team roping title

WINDOW ROCK

A 6.7 second run in the finals of the 2025 Reno Rodeo helped secure the team roping title for Diné cowboy Aaron Tsinigine and his heeling partner Jeremy Buhler.

The Reno Rodeo title was Buhler’s first for the Canadian cowboy while Tsinigine captured his third one. The Tuba City team roper won his first Reno Rodeo in 2018 with then-partner Trey Yates of Pueblo, Colorado. In 2022, he won the crown with California cowboy Kyle Lockett.

“This is pretty cool,” Tsinigine said of his latest crown. “Reno is the biggest rodeo to kick off the summer and I was able to do it three times.”

The duo roped three draws in 16.2 seconds to conclude the nine-day rodeo on Saturday night.

In the opening round, they posted a first place run of 4.7 seconds. In the next round they added another solid run of 4.8 seconds that put them in the driver’s seat for the aggregate race.

With some time play with the Tsinigine/Buhler duo made a business decision run in the short round as that 6.7 run earned them a second-place finish in the round.

All told, they collected $17,410 each as Tsinigine moved to No. 11 in the PRCA world standings with $50,116. Buhler, meanwhile, is sitting at No. 20 with $36,558 in earnings.

Tsinigine said the big payoff win was something they needed moving forward. Nonetheless, the two cowboys have taken a modest approach to the 2025 season.

“Jeremy is doing a lot of horse shows, so I’m entering whatever he tells me,” Tsinigine said. “I don’t know if I’m rodeoing hard or not, but I’ve been working a lot a home, too.”

Unlike previous years, Tsinigine only entered four rodeos during the Cowboy Christmas run as he wrapped his road trip on Wednesday morning.

“I’m headed home now, and I’m going to enjoy this time off,” he said. “I’ll go to a few more prorodeos new week. I’ll keep putting my name in these big rodeos.”

In other rodeo action, the Muskogee Nation Festival Tour Rodeo INFR Automatic Qualifier Tour Rodeo finished its two-day rodeo on Saturday night in Okmulgee, Oklahoma.

Local competitors Creighton Curley, Bailey Bates, Cameron Kanuho, and Scooter Garcia were event champions. The four champions earned automatic qualifications to the Indian National Finals Rodeo in October.

Curley won the saddle bronc event with a 71-point ride as he collected $2,085.39 at the one-go round rodeo.

“The horse I got on was from a contractor in Oklahoma,” Curley said of Big Horn Rodeo Company. “The horse wasn’t too good, but I manage to make whatever I had to get a score.”

After his ride Friday night, Curley had no inkling that his score would survive Saturday’s performance.

“Honestly, I thought my score was going to get beat the next day,” Curley said. “But I think I kind of got lucky because there were only three of us to ride up. Everybody else bucked off on Saturday.”

As of May 23, Curley was sitting third in the INFR Tour standings with $4,278.25 won behind event leader Randin Wagner ($7,509.55) and Jalen Joaquin ($6,161.71).

The standings, however, does not include his Muskogee Nation title win and his third-place finish at the Lane J Silversmith Memorial Stand Alone Event held on June 7.

“The two guys that are leading have been to almost every tour rodeo this year,” Curley said. “I have been entered in about six, so I have a lot of catching up to do.”

In the breakaway, Bates turned in a sizzling 1.89 run to win the Oklahoma rodeo as she pocketed $3,794.31.

In the team roping, the Kanuho/Garcia combo topped the field with a 5.14 effort that paid each cowboy $5,350.95.

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