by Hap Rocketto
The Alaska Nanooks rifle team got off to a great start at the 2010 NCAA Men’s and Women’s Rifle Championships in their attempt to regain the title lost last year to West Virginia by winning the team smallbore competition with an aggregate score of 2,320: good for a six-point advantage over their hosts, the Texas Christian University Horned Frogs (2314) and a 12-point cushion over the defending NCAA Rifle Champions, the West Virginia University Mountaineers.
Fortunes were reversed on the second day when TCU posted an air rifle score or 2361 that was 17 points ahead of it nearest competition, The Wildcats of the University of Kentucky. In third place was the Murray State Racers. With West Virginia and Alaska in fifth and sixth place respectively the host Horned Frogs ended up upending both UAF and WVU who found themselves in second and third place, for their first NCAA title. TCU also entered the history books as the first all female team to cop the title.
Kentucky finished fourth while Army, Nebraska, Murray State, and Navy rounded out the field.
Jonathan Hall, of Columbus State, and Keely Stankey were tied at 595 going into the final of the individual air rifle championship. Hall put together an amazing final score to take the title by a nearly three point margin over Patrik Sartz, of Alaska, and Navy Midshipman Chris Burleson. Hall averaged a 10.5 on his first nine shots but let the final pellet slip out for a 9.7, giving him a 104.9 in the final.
Smallbore competition saw Sarah Scherer survive the final after a 583 three way with Bryant Wallizer and Patrik Starz. Her 102 final, with a 10.9 on her final shot being the dot on an exclamation point, handily kept her ahead of her competition. Wallizer and Starz and Chris Buleson, on the strength of a 101.5 final, finished second and third.
TCU fielded Erin Lorenzen, Simone Riford, Sarah Scherer, Sarah Beard, and Caitlin Morrison in its championship effort. Patrik Starz, Jace Bures, William Galligan, Cody Rutter, Dustin Chesbro, and Katie Fretts formed teh UAF squad while Brandi Eskew, Andy Lamson, Bryant Wallizer, Tom Santelli, and Michael Kulbacki represented West Virginia.
Live coverage of the NCAA Rifle Championships was impressive and popular, so much so that the server crashed on the first day from overload.
You can view the results here: http://www.odcmp.org/range/startframe.htm
