Rifle: WVU Takes Aim at GARC Championships
February 19, 2010 12:52 PM | General
February 19, 2010
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| Andy Lamson |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The No. 1-ranked West Virginia University rifle team seeks its first Great American Rifle Conference (GARC) title in 10 years as it travels to Oxford, Miss., Feb. 20-21, for the conference championship at the Patricia C. Lamar National Guard Readiness Center.
The defending national champion Mountaineers (11-0, 7-0 GARC) enter this weekend’s tournament as the conference regular-season champions. WVU owns a 17-match regular-season win streak and is the first team since the 2001 Mountaineer squad to enter the postseason undefeated. Additionally, WVU has yet to drop a discipline match this season.
“We want to put to practice this weekend all of our hard work from the season,” says fourth-year coach Jon Hammond. “We are going to treat this championship just like any other match, yet do all we can to win the title. It was one of our goals this year to win every match. If we concentrate on our capabilities, instead of thinking about the final outcome, our results should be good.”
The Mountaineers have not won a conference title since earning three-straight from 1998-2000; at the time, the GARC was known as the Midwest-America Rifle Conference.
WVU completed its regular season last weekend with a 4659-4612 victory over No. 8-ranked Nebraska on Feb. 13 in an NCAA qualifying match. The Mountaineers also earned a 4659-4530 win over Memphis. WVU’s victory over the Tigers secured the squad’s sixth regular-season title.
Junior transfer Nicco Campriani enters the championships as WVU’s top shooter, having set school records in air rifle (598), smallbore (593) and combined score (1189) this season.
Junior Andy Lamson leads the team with the best 11-match combine score average of 1166.82. Senior Bryant Wallizer paces the air rifle corps with a 589.27 average, while junior Brandi Eskew owns a team-best 578.82 smallbore average.
Ole Miss plays host to the championships for the sixth-straight year. No. 3-ranked Kentucky returns as the reigning champions; the Wildcats have won five titles since 2001. WVU placed second at last year’s championships, the team’s highest finish since 2003, and narrowly fell to UK, 4650-4645.
Rounding out this year’s championships field are No. 6 Army, the 2008 GARC champions, NC State and Xavier.
The championships will open at 7:30 a.m. CT on Saturday, and will run through Sunday afternoon. The smallbore competition will coincide with the championships’ opening, with the finals set for 5:30 p.m. The air rifle tournament will start at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, with the finals to follow at 12:30 p.m. Sunday.
Fans can follow the Mountaineers this weekend by clicking HERE for live stats.
