For three years Powell High School senior Brighton Streeter had been working to win state, always coming up against tough teams full of fellow Panthers in the state robotics competition Powell has dominated for half a decade. 

Last year, his team, 6437, struggled at the state competition against a Powell team with three seniors who Streeter said were his mentors. 

“It was actually really frustrating last year, but we learned a lot, and we grew a lot as a team,” he said. “And then this year, we were able to come out on top with all of the stuff we were able to do.”

This year at state, he used that knowledge, worked with his team to put together the best robot possible and put together a dominant state run, winning by a wide margin over second place, another Powell team. 

When Streeter sat down holding the state trophy, he couldn’t hold back the tears. 

“I knew it was my last year, and it was that last opportunity for me to go and win and to do something big,” he said. “And I just remember, you know, going up and grabbing that trophy and just sitting there and sitting on that bench, just looking at the trophy, I just started bawling, because I knew, I finally did that thing that I really wanted to do.”

Streeter was joined by Tyler Kruger, Estrella Gonzales, Sam Williams, River James and Kamea Wisniewski on the winning team at state, which allied with Powell’s second place team and 2025 state winner 3189 to secure the big 1-2 finish over third place Worland. 

Team 3189 includes Calvin Opps, David Stensing, Zach Peterson, Huston Dearcorn, Hayden Peters and Joseph Pittman. 

The teams were two of five the dominant Powell program sent to the state competition in Casper this year, accounting for nearly a fifth of all the teams present. Because of that dominance, coach Joel Hayano said his students are very open to helping other teams with their robots — they want good competition. 

“In reality, we all help each other out,” he said. “So if a team needs something, we’re more than willing to help.”

That works within Powell’s program as well, hence the alliance that helped to ensure a 1-2 finish at state (Worland finished third). 

The teams did so well even with a change in the rules this year. 

“I think it was more stressful because the rules were changed on who wins for state,” Gonzales said. “Rather than, if you win the competition, you get to go to Worlds, you have to score points, and the amount of points you get is what ranks you.”

But when Team 6437 won both the main competition and the top Inspire Award, there was no doubt. 

“We scored every point that we possibly could have,” she said. 

Many on the team worked years to get to that point. And each year the challenge changes — this year it focused on the robots’ prowess at shooting little balls into designated locations. 

“So we get kits initially, and it’s just basically four wheels, four motors and a little frame, and then on that, we build, buy parts and pieces, and then at the end of the season, we’ll take it apart and build another robot for the next season,” Kruger said, adding, “we hope to use every part to spend as little money as we can.”

Stensing knows all about seeing a robot through to success, as he was on Team 3189 last year when it won state and advanced to Worlds. He said the team did well again this year, just not quite as well as their teammates. 

“We competed really well,” he said. “I mean, we ran into a lot of issues, but we actually went undefeated the whole competition, and we were able to pair up with 6437 in the finals to secure second place.”

The other Powell teams may not have scored quite as high, but still gained experience. 

Elizabeth Halberstadt said her team struggled at state, but still won the Sustain Award for their ability to use resources well. 

“We had kind of a rough going at State,” she said. “A lot of things on our robot broke during our first couple matches, so it was really hard for us to do things later on in the game, but we found that we could, like, play defense really well, and that we were able to push around the other bots on the mat and stuff. And so that was always great.”

Talon Grau’s team managed to reach the elimination bracket for Worlds qualifying but fell short in the second elimination round. Now Grau is aiming to accomplish what Streeter and his crew did this year. 

“I want to be geared up for Worlds next year,” he said.