The St. Louis U. High Rifle team now has two matches under its belt, both of which went relatively well considering the recent changes due to COVID-19. The Blue Jay Classic match was finalized with SLUH taking second place and the Junior Air Rifle National Championship gave SLUH 44th place out of 76 teams.

The Jr. Bills took home second place last weekend with a 572/600 from senior team captain Ryan Janson. Janson’s score gave the top team a 2244/2400. Unfortunately, Ozark High School came in with four very skilled shooters and beat SLUH by 53 points.

This past weekend, the Jr. Bills shot in a Junior Air Rifle National Championship. While this is not the actual National Championship that determines the best national team, it is still a big deal and typically the winners of this match have the opportunity to shoot in a military base later in the year. 

On SLUH’s top team of shooters was Janson, Andrew Kessler, Sam Quinlavan, Mason Wodicker and Nick Storer. This match was a decimal score, meaning the maximum score increased from 600 to 654. Janson was the top shooter on the team with a 575.9, followed by Kessler with a 574.9, Quinlavan with a 571.6, Wodicker with a 568.7, and then Storer with a 564.6.

“I would say we had a really good turnout throughout. The varsity especially shot great stands,” said junior Grant Grabowski. “Overall I think we all can walk out of the match satisfied with our scores.”

The final score may not be enough to get the team to qualify for the championship, but the shooters have another match on Jan. 23 at SLUH. The match will be the NRA Jr. 3-P Air Sectional. As it stands, the majority of the next few matches will be at SLUH unless restrictions are raised allowing the team to travel.