Rifle Looks for Sixth Straight GARC Title
February 26, 2015 11:55 AM | General
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| The 2014 GARC Champions. The WVU rifle team looks for its sixth straight title this weekend. |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The No. 1-ranked West Virginia University Rifle Team looks to extend its win streak to six at the Great American Rifle Conference (GARC) Championships. The tournament will be held February 27-March 1, at the Patricia C. Lamar National Guard Readiness Center, in Oxford, Mississippi.
The Mountaineers (11-1, 8-0 GARC) will shoot the team smallbore relay on Saturday, starting at 8 a.m. ET, and the air rifle relay on Sunday at 9 a.m. ET. The individual finals will be held after team relays each day.
“We always want to go and win a conference championship,” said coach Jon Hammond. “We’ve had a really great GARC record over the last couple years. However, it’s also really good practice for NCAAs. We want to practice relay times, the counting times and get as much preparation as we can for the next couple weeks.”
WVU owns a conference-best nine GARC championships and eight regular-season titles, including the 2013 and 2014 titles.
The championship’s nine-team field also features No. 5 Kentucky, No. 7 Nebraska and No. 10 Memphis.
WVU averages a 4703 team aggregate score while also boasting 2373 and 2329 air rifle and smallbore averages, respectively. The team has maintained the No. 1 ranking each week this season and owns the three best aggregate scores in the nation (4718, 4717, 4714), sharing the fourth-best 4712 score with No. 2 Alaska-Fairbanks.
The Mountaineers won last year’s championship with a 4700 aggregate score. WVU placed first in smallbore with a 2337 score and entered Sunday’s air rifle competition with a 23-point advantage. Despite a second-place 2763 showing in air rifle, WVU took home the title.
“There’s a lot of competition in the conference,” Hammond said. “Usually half of the NCAA Championships field comes from it. There are nine teams now. More teams means more strong individuals, and that means the finals will be tougher to get into. It’s the toughest conference in NCAA rifle, and it’s good for us to get the experience.”
Senior Thomas Kyanko paces the Mountaineers in smallbore with a 583 average and scored 586 in the open relay and 431.0 for fourth place in the final at last year’s championships.
Junior Garrett Spurgeon shot a team best 587 smallbore showing at last year’s competition, and placed fifth overall with a 419.8 score in the final.
Sophomore Jean-Pierre Lucas entered last year’s final tied in first place with Spurgeon and finished third overall with a 441.0 final score.
Senior Ziva Dvorsak holds the team’s high average in air rifle (596) and shot a career-high 598 score in the open relay last year. Classmate Maren Prediger won the individual air rifle title after a 593 open relay showing and 206.7 score in the final.
Of note, Dvorsak finished first overall at her first GARC Championships with a two-day total of 1180. She qualified for the air rifle final but was not able to participate due to travel constraints.
“Our shooters need to focus on their own performance,” said Hammond. “They need to soak in the atmosphere and stay within themselves, shooting their match as normal. When they’re on the firing point, they need to do what they do day-to-day and put themselves in their own bubble and have a good performance.”
Most recently, the Mountaineers shot a 4705 NCAA qualifying score at the WVU Rifle Range on February 21.
Conference award winners will be announced at a banquet on Friday evening.
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