By Matt Gade

605 Sports

SPEARFISH — A year after their first season and following a series of weather postponements to kick off the 2025 season, the Spearfish Spartans finally made their home debut at the new Keating Resources SportsPlex softball complex on the east side of town.

“I think you could definitely tell we felt a little more settled than we have in our other games,” Spearfish head coach Bell Luebken said. “You could see a difference in the girls' demeanor. So it's really exciting to finally have some home games this season.”

Spearfish met the Watertown Arrows first and then the Brookings Bobcats in a pair of games Friday with the Sturgis Scoopers playing the opposite order against Watertown and Brookings.

The Spearfish Spartans line up for the player introductions before the start of their game against Brookings on Friday night. (Matt Gade/605 Sports)

A year ago, during the Spartans' first season of varsity softball, the team played on the sole softball field located at the Black Hills Power Sports Complex on the west side of Spearfish.

The new facility features four fields with newly constructed bleachers, dugouts and red dirt infield.

“It's definitely nice to be on something new and kind of made a little bit better for what we do, and having the big back stops and the nice clay dirt and all that. I mean, no complaints,” Luebken said.

The softball complex was completed last summer as the city of Spearfish hosted summer leagues in its first use of the complex.

Now the Spartans and the other leagues balance each other’s schedules and needs to make sure teams have access to the field.

This season, Spearfish has practiced at the KRSP but the team was anxious to finally get a game in. 

“I like it a lot better,” Spearfish senior infielder Danika Brown said of the new complex. “But the infield is a lot bigger than what we kind of want, so it's kind of hard to judge where to stand and all that stuff. So it's a learning curve that you have to get used to. It's definitely a learning curve that we have to get used to and adapt to, but that's what our team's really good at.”

On Friday, the Spartans fell to the Watertown Arrows 11-8 in their first game of the day before falling to Brookings 11-0 in the nightcap.

With Spearfish able to host multiple games at the same time, coach Luebken said she likes the fact they will be able to host more teams at the complex. 

Brown said having multiple fields has made practices easier for the team to be able to split up to work on different position groups. 

The Spearfish Spartans play the Brookings Bobcats during a game on Friday night at Keating Resources SportsPlex. (Matt Gade/605 Sports)

But when multiple games are going on at the same time, the players need to be focused on their surroundings. 

“It's a little bit stressful because you never know if another ball is going to come over the fence or not, but it's really fun to see other people can like play on our field too,” Brown said.

The Spartans (1-6) host Mitchell and Yankton for a pair of games at the complex on Saturday with Sturgis playing opposite the Spartans.