Andrew Ward and Jake Long are the 2025 PRCA world champion team ropers, winning the title—and the aggregate—in dramatic fashion on the 10th steer in the Thomas & Mack.
Ward—35, with six NFR qualifications and an NFR aggregate title to his name—won the world with $373,838.24, while Long—41, with 15 trips to Las Vegas—earned $372,091 for the gold buckle.
World Championship Scenario
Mathematically speaking, Ward and Long entered Round 10 with the lowest chance at the titles of the four teams in world championship contention. Which meant they were also the first of those four teams to back into the box in a soft round of team roping up until that point.
They were 11th in the round, and they drew the steer that other teams had already won $69,491.68 on in the fourth and seventh rounds.
“We drew a good steer,” Ward said. “That’s all I was trying to do tonight—draw a good steer, get a good start, go as fast as I can without messing up. The average is a big deal and I thought we executed well.”
Long admitted he wasn’t the guy running scenarios. In fact, he spent most of the day trying to convince everyone around him not to get their hopes up.
“I told everybody…we maybe have a 2% chance. Don’t get your hopes up,” Long said. “I really didn’t think we had much of a chance.”
Ward and Long said their Round 10 run felt like a straightforward execution of the run they’d been building all week, not a moment they knew would decide a world title. Their focus was simply drawing a steer they could rope, getting a good start and making the best run possible without forcing anything, especially with the average still in play. Long said he never felt like they were “in a race” and wasn’t trying to beat anyone, just put a solid run on the board and let the rest unfold.
Because they went first among the teams in contention, they had no scenario to chase and no numbers in mind, and when they came out of the arena, neither of them knew whether they had won the world or just a round. The run itself didn’t feel dramatic in the moment—it felt like doing what they had practiced and then waiting to see what happened next.
When the flag fell in 3.9, Ward and Long celebrated—but then they rode into the alley to watch the final teams come and get them.
Immediately after, Clint Summers and Jade Corkill had a tough steer that went left hard, and they made an impossibly good run on him to stop the clock in 4.2 seconds. Then Kaleb Driggers and Junior Nogueira—who also had a steer that had been dang tough all week and went left hard—stopped the clock in 3.9 seconds, too, to tie Ward and Long for the round win. Kolton Schmidt and Jonathan Torres were in the driver’s seat for the gold buckle going into Round 10, and they only needed to catch—even with Ward and Long and Driggers and Nogueira splitting the day money. They were last out, and Schmidt’s steer checked off hard right. Their no-time left the world title in the air while secretaries (and TRJ’s staff) crunched the numbers.
“I honestly didn’t know,” Long said. “I even looked at Joe (Beaver) and tried to ask if we’d won. I figured Driggers and them would know…When they came out, they looked happy, but they didn’t know either.”
Ward got his first clue from above.
“When my dad gave me a thumbs-up from the top, I thought it might be for the average,” Ward said. “But I bet he knew we’d won the world title. He knows the numbers.”
Even then, the reality didn’t land right away. They ran a victory lap and took photos for winning the NFR aggregate—44.0 on 9 head—still unsure if gold buckles came with it.
“That is an incredible thing to not know, and then have the lady tell us,” Ward said. “We already took our pictures with the average win…and then she tells us we’re world champs. I’m like, you’re kidding me. What a neat deal.”
What It Means
When it finally settled in, Ward felt relief before anything else.
“I was honestly just thankful it was over,” he said. “Ten runs is stressful…For it to finally go our way is an honor.”
For Long, the moment landed differently. Not as shock—but as release.
“I don’t know that you can really put it into words,” Long said. “You start thinking maybe it’s not meant to be…And that’s fine too in a sense of I’ve had a wonderful career and I had come to terms with that. I wasn’t going to maybe achieve that ultimate goal.”
That acceptance made the emotion sharper when it finally did happen. Long admitted he’d carried the weight all week, even when the runs felt right.
“I’ve been sad for several days now just because I didn’t feel like I was heeling quite as good as I needed to,” he said. “We were making really, really great runs and they were just kicking us in the teeth in the rounds.”
Round 9 became the hinge point.
“When I rope the leg in round nine, I knew if I caught that one, we were alive and we’d have a chance,” Long said. “And God loved Andy…he came out there and cheered me up, wouldn’t let me be sad.”
Ward, watching his partner finally cross the finish line, kept coming back to that point.
“He’s had a lot of close calls out here,” Ward said. “Jake’s been doing it a long time…so it is a neat thing to get him across the finish line.”
Trusting the Process
What Ward and Long had in Round 10 wasn’t a secret weapon or a gamble—it was a run they trusted. One built on repetition—not desperation—even as the rounds got faster around them.
“I’m a creature of the habits that I’ve built at home, so I have to stick to the process,” Ward said. “If I come out of that I’ll hate myself for it.”
That process, Long explained, is what makes Ward so difficult to beat in the Thomas & Mack when the pressure spikes. Ward turns cattle with footwork, shaping the run in a way that gives Long a clean, predictable look.
“He turns the cow more with footwork versus just kind of amateur rodeo, lay-your-horse-down style,” Long said. “He makes my job incredibly easy…just lays him up super easy to heel fast.”
This year’s steers felt softer than usual, Long said, which can tempt teams into chasing speed and making mistakes.
“It shouldn’t all be on him,” Long said. “It is called team roping…If either one of us gets stuck in ‘we’re going to do it this certain way’…eventually it won’t work. So we have to be willing to change with the times.”
On the 10th steer, Ward did exactly what he’d done all week: trusted his horse, handled his end, and gave Long a clean look. Long felt like he finally hit the timing window where he could move his feet and speed the run up.
“Tonight was the first one that I heeled fast,” Long said. “I felt like I did speed the run up a little bit tonight.”
Even then, it came with a jolt of adrenaline.
“My pinky, was in there, huh?” Long laughed. “I got excited and I went to kind of pull back before I actually had a wrap…Luckily it was in there.”
Ward noticed, but what stood out more to him was that Long never left the plan.
“I was very proud of Jake,” Ward said. “He was like an old vet. He would not come out of the process of what we said we were going to come do. And it’s hard to do that for 10 nights here.”
World Championship Horsepower
Like every world title, this one belonged to the horses as much as the men.
Ward rode his 2011 gelding RLJ Cashnczechtafame instead of his former NFR aggregate championship mount Biscuit, a decision driven by feel and preparation.
“Biscuit was abscessing, and I wasn’t getting to practice on him,” Ward said. “I finished with Kollin (VonAhn) last year on Henry and we won a hundred thousand…and it felt like easy roping. He’s very big strong, but he’s very quick.”
Long rode Hezaluckysonofagun, a young horse whose talent—and personality—changed the way the Thomas & Mack felt to him.
“He wants to be your best friend,” Long said. “He would literally pin me up against the wall…want you to just sit there and scratch on him. He made heeling in here as easy as it’s ever been for me.”
Long said Ward pushed him to commit to ‘Copper; earlier in the year, even when the risk felt real—because the horse is only 6.
“For him to step out in faith with me and let me ride that horse meant the world to me,” Long said. “He has not cost us 1 cent the whole time.”
On the Homefront
When it was finally over, Long didn’t wait to say thank you to the one who mattered most in this journey.
“I didn’t want to wait until afterwards,” Long said. “I had to run up there and at least hug Tasha…She has put up with way more than she should.”
Ward did the same, calling wife Hayli from downstairs.
“Without her, I don’t know how we do it,” Ward said. “You don’t see the work that she puts in…Having a great wife, it’s incredible. It’s a gift from God.”
More Perspective
Long is now a $3.3 million heeler, who’s won the Bob Feist Invitational, the Wildfire, the George Strait and two NFR aggregate titles. Now, after 15 attempts, he’s a world champion.
“I’m not getting younger,” Long said. “I think I was the third oldest heeler here. You start thinking maybe it’s not meant to be. Maybe it’s not going to be something that’s in the cards for you. And that’s fine too in a sense of I’ve had a wonderful career, and I had come to terms with that. I wasn’t going to maybe achieve that ultimate goal. So I’ve cried more tonight than I’ve cried in a long time because it was highly emotional.”
For Ward, the win was as much about getting his partner that gold buckle than it was about getting one for himself.
“I remember watching this rodeo on the couch, and Jake looking like he was going to win one when I was in my 20s,” Ward said. “He’s been doing it a long time, and so it is a neat thing to get him across the finish line. It’s great for me, but I was so pumped when Jake, he’s got it now, so that’s awesome.”
When the night finally slowed down, Long still sounded like a man easing into a truth he’d waited years to hear.
“It doesn’t seem real,” he said. “They can’t take it away from me now.”
And when both men searched for the right word to explain it all—the run, the years, the waiting—they kept landing in the same place.
Gratitude.
| Team | Total | Head |
|---|---|---|
| Andrew Ward / Jake Long | 44 | 9 |
| Clint Summers / Jade Corkill | 49.7 | 9 |
| Kaleb Driggers / Junior Nogueira | 53.5 | 9 |
| Kolton Schmidt / Jonathan Torres | 33 | 8 |
| Derrick Begay / Colter Todd | 56.6 | 8 |
| Lightning Aguilera / Kaden Profili | 43.1 | 7 |
| Riley Minor / Brady Minor | 48 | 7 |
| Dawson Graham / Dillon Graham | 31.2 | 6 |
| Cyle Denison / Lane Mitchell | 34.2 | 6 |
| Tanner Tomlinson / Travis Graves | 36.3 | 6 |
| Clay Smith / Coleby Payne | 37.5 | 6 |
| Dustin Egusquiza / Levi Lord | 39.2 | 6 |
| Luke Brown / Trey Yates | 43.4 | 6 |
| Tyler Wade / Wesley Thorp | 34.4 | 5 |
| Jake Smith / Douglas Rich | 43.1 | 5 |
Heading
| Competitor | Total |
|---|---|
| Andrew Ward | $373,838.26 |
| Kaleb Driggers | $367,885.01 |
| Clint Summers | $344,921.51 |
| Kolton Schmidt | $338,807.51 |
| Tanner Tomlinson | $276,605.71 |
| Lightning Aguilera | $261,550.58 |
| Dawson Graham | $248,192.21 |
| Dustin Egusquiza | $237,829.39 |
| Derrick Begay | $235,540.94 |
| Tyler Wade | $224,632.41 |
| Riley Minor | $210,825.41 |
| Cyle Denison | $199,907.28 |
| Clay Smith | $199,835.04 |
| Jake Smith | $194,087.46 |
| Luke Brown | $177,067.86 |
Heeling
| Competitor | Total |
|---|---|
| Jake Long | $372,091.71 |
| Junior Nunes Nogueira | $367,885.01 |
| Jade Corkill | $345,246.73 |
| Jonathan Torres | $330,541.41 |
| Kaden Profili | $260,350.38 |
| Dillon Graham | $248,192.23 |
| Travis Graves | $242,717.48 |
| Levi Lord | $235,447.88 |
| Colter Todd | $233,188.59 |
| Wesley Thorp | $224,632.41 |
| Brady Minor | $210,825.43 |
| Lane Mitchell | $200,936.80 |
| Coleby Payne | $190,638.41 |
| Douglas Rich | $183,337.45 |
| Trey Yates | $177,067.85 |
Originally written by Chelsea Shaffer on The Team Roping Journal