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Aidan Battle playing much bigger than his size for Washburn football
By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
At 5-foot-6, 170 pounds, place-kicker Aidan Battle is the smallest player on the 2025 Washburn University football roster.
Aidan Battle is off to a quick start in his first season as Washburn's place-kicker, including a 51-yard field goal. [Photo courtesy of Washburn Athletics]
But the former Atchison and Butler Community College standout has already come up big in just two games for the Ichabods this fall.
Battle, who received All-Jayhawk Conference recognition in both of his seasons at Butler, made an immediate impact in his Washburn debut on Aug. 30, kicking 37 and 51-yard field goals and connecting on both of his extra-point attempts as the Ichabods topped Truman State, 20-17.
Battle's 51-yarder, which proved to be the difference in the game, was the longest by an Ichabod kicker since 2013 and helped him earn MIAA Player of the Week honors.
Battle only got one kicking opportunity in last Saturday's 34-7 MIAA loss to Northwest Missouri, but kicked the extra point after WU's lone touchdown to remain perfect on the year.
Despite his success at Butler, Battle didn't receive much recruiting attention after his sophomore season until Washburn came calling to save the day.
"It was about the middle of December and it was kind of time to decide whether I was going to go back (to Butler for the spring semester) or stay at home and take a gap semester,'' Battle said. "Then in the middle of one night I had contact with Coach (Zach) Watkins and I've been an Ichabod ever since, so I'm just blessed for that opportunity for sure.
"The facilities are amazing, the school itself is a great academic school and I could come in and get the degree I was looking for. It's a great environment with the coaching staff and it just felt like home. As soon as I stepped in on my visit the campus just felt amazing and I just had a great time, so I didn't look back from the moment I got here.''
Battle transferred to Washburn for the spring semester, which he said was an advantage.
"It really helped because I was able to get used to a new environment and a new coaching staff and everyone and everything's been awesome since I got here,'' he said.
Rural soccer drops 3-2 double overtime heartbreaker to Blue Valley West
By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Washburn Rural boys soccer coach Brian Hensyel knew that visiting Blue Valley West would present a tough challenge in Tuesday night's non-league game and that's exactly what he wanted.
Senior Dylan Willingham scored a pair of goals, giving him seven on the season, in Washburn Rural's 3-2 double-overtime loss to Blue Valley West Tuesday at Rural. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
And even though the Junior Blues dropped a 3-2 double-overtime heartbreaker at McElroy Field, the veteran coach is counting on the loss to make Rural better as the 2025 season wears on.
"No. 1, we always want to play the best teams we can play,'' Hensyel said. "The only way you're prepared to play people at the end is to play teams like Blue Valley West, we play Blue Valley North later in the year and we take a trip to Iowa and play some good teams. You have to test them and we told our guys before the game, we've won a couple of games and we've been pretty impressive doing it, but we needed to play somebody really good and they're good.
"So from the perspective of the third game of the year, playing a really good team, it's good for us to kind of find out where we were. And what we found out is we can be pretty good and we had a pretty good first half and put in a couple of set piece goals, which is something that we do. I thought we just let off the gas and let off the energy a little bit to start the second half.''
Washburn Rural, now 2-1, jumped out in front 2-0 at halftime on a pair of goals from senior star Dylan Willingham, but Blue Valley West (4-1) battled back with two second-half goals to force overtime and scored the game-winning goal with just 42 seconds remaining in the second OT.
Willingham put Rural up 1-0 when he converted a free kick with 16:10 left in the opening half and added a second goal, his seventh of the season, off an assist from senior Brandon Hamilton with 7:06 remaining in the half.
Hayden soccer drops 2-1 non-league decision to Ottawa
By VINCE LOVERGINE
TopSports.news
Hayden boys soccer hit the pitch on Monday afternoon, wrapping up its three-game homestand to begin the season with a 2-1 non-league loss to Ottawa.
Joey Gartner's Hayden soccer team fell to 0-3 on Monday, but the Wildcats played their closest game of the season in a 2-1 loss to Ottawa. [File photo/TSN]
It's been tough sledding so far for 0-3 Hayden, which also lost a non-league contest to city rival Topeka West and its Centennial League opener to Topeka High.
The Wildcats have managed only two goals and allowed 13 in their three games, but took a step forward on Monday with their closest game of the season.
Hayden would strike first at the 32-minute mark after Aiden Roberts snuck in a pass inside the box to Riley Bartley to make it 1-nil.
“We did a good job of switching it to the side, they took it down the line, made a pass back, Riley was right there in the spot, got the tap in, his positioning was good and the cross was good, too,” Hayden coach Joey Gartner said.
Ottawa would respond six minutes later after a dump pass from beyond midfield that led to Josiah Mitchell, who struck with a header to tie it at 1-1 going into halftime.
