KDSN Radio

A Spencer teacher and coach is being praised for saving two boys who'd been swept into the Little Sioux River. Evan Scheck, a coach for the girl's tennis program in Spencer, was near the river in Spencer for a Thursday afternoon tournament.

"Just all of the sudden had an older gentlemen come up to myself, who was sitting at a picnic table kind of managing the tournament, and he had said there were boys down by the river and they think they need help," he says. "One of the boys had kind of become visible to our girls and that's when Bob and I realized: 'We have to go!'"

The two boys were riding their bicycles on a flooded trail and were swept away in the current. When Scheck got to the scene, he told one boy who was closer to shore to get out of the water.

"The more I look back at it, I was like I didn't have a single ounce of thought of like what the dangers lies ahead. I just sprang into action," he says. "When we got there, one of the boys was probably a good 30 yards away, stuck on one of the power line posts that was in there."

Scheck says the hardest part was trying to calm the boy. 

"The thing that I remember him saying the most was: 'I don't want to die,'" Scheck says. "He's scared. He's scared for his life right now."

Scheck tried to swim to shore with the boy on his back, but they sunk in the water. Scheck says at that moment, police arrived to join the rescue. Scheck took the boy back to the pole, then swam to an officer who was in the water with a flotation device attached to a rope.

"I swam back to the kid, wrapped it around him and gave him the little like flotation device and I said: "All right, this is what's going to happen. I'm going to swim about 5 feet away from you because this is where I'm going to catch you.'"

Scheck caught the boy and they were pulled ashore by police.