BHS Demon Shooters Stand Tall at SCTP Nationals
Sparta, IL, July 21, 2012 -- For the last seven years the Burlington High School Shooting Team has worked to become one of the top High School clay target programs in the United States. Over those years the team visited the podium at the Scholastic Clay Target Program (SCTP) Nationals on three occasions including a runner-up in their first year of competition, a third place High School and second place Intermediate Entry award in 2009. Last year they shocked everyone when the small town team not only won the High School Division but the overall SCTP National Championship.
The 2012 Demons Varsity team swept every trapshooting event for the second year in a row and returned to the SCTP Nationals held annually from July 17th to 21st at the World Shooting and Recreation Complex in Sparta, IL with the goal of repeating as SCTP National Champions. The team has built on it’s success year after year and this year was no exception as the Burlington bunch put together several strong squads of five shooters to take aim at the tourney’s top spot.
In SCTP team competition five athletes shoot four rounds of 25 trap targets for two straight days totally 1,000 targets per team for the Championship event. The BHS Demons Varsity #1 squad of Myles Walker 98, Ethan Kerr 99, Christian Jensen 99, Jordan Hintz 95 and Josh Crisimagna 92 tallied 483 of 500 the first day to trail the Warren County Claybusters (PA) by just one target in the overall competition and five birds ahead of Arlington High School (TN) in the High School division which represented 41 different High School programs from all over the country.
Proving the depth of the BHS program, Demons Varsity #2 squad was lurking just behind in sixth place overall and third in the High School division. Cody Schilz led the #2 squad with his first-ever perfect round of 100-straight and was joined by Terry Carr 99, Matt Henningfield 93, Devon Stickrod 93 and Mariah Kerr 92 totaling 477 of 500.
The tension was obvious on the young shooters faces as they prepared for the final day of the Championship knowing they needed a near perfect round to pass the Pennsylvania team and win a second straight title. The team did their best to shake the pressure breaking 482 of 500 targets to end with a total of 965. Ethan Kerr showed his senior leadership with another 99 (198 total) to lead the team. Crisamagna 98 (190), Jensen 97 (196), Hintz 96 (191) and Walker 92 (190) could only wait for the other teams scores to be posted to see if they had repeated for a second season.
The Demons Varsity #2 squad had another solid round of 464 to end with 941. Henningfield led the way with a 98 (191 total) followed by Stickrod 96 (189), Carr 95 (194), Schilz 90 (190) and Mariah Kerr 85 (177) would now wait for find out how their scores would hold out against the 89 different Varsity squads.
As the afternoon awards ceremony drew nearer the final scores were posted at www.ShootersPost.com and the Jefferson County Patriot Shooters (TN) snuck past both the teams that were in front of them the first day to take the overall crown with 968 targets just besting the Pennsylvania team by just one and the Demons #1 team by three targets. While disappointed that they did not win the overall National Championship the entire Burlington Demons team would celebrate several times during the twilight awards ceremony as BHS Demons #1 took the top honors while the Demons #2 squad brought home the bronze in the High School division.
The Demons Junior Varsity squad of Alexa McCarthy 194, Daniel Santos 194, Clayton Deford 187, Nolan Schenning 188, and Melanie Uhlenhake 162 also stood proud on the podium by winning the bronze medal following an exciting shoot-off with the Arlington High School (TN) JV in front several hundred spectators in the grandstands after both teams had tied for third with 925 targets in the 36-team JV field.
McCarthy’s 194 earned her the individual gold medal for JV women and Courtney Uhlenhake won the individual gold medal for ladies in the Rookie category.
Earlier in the week the Demons had numerous shooters participate in both the Skeet and Sporting Clays championships with Ethan Kerr again showing his senior leadership pacing the Demons in both events with 172 of 200 in Sporting Clays and 185 of 200 in Skeet. Kerr will soon head to Lindenwood University in Missouri where he will continue to hone his clay target skills.
“I have been fortunate to have had a great group of coaches to work with me and help me to become the shooter that I am today. I would especially like to thank Tom Wondrash (our original team Head Coach) for developing this program in our area,” Kerr said. “Winning a second National Title in my final year with the team was a nice way for me to leave, I am leaving the team in the capable hands of my younger team mates and wish them the best of luck. It was a pleasure to shoot with you through the years.”
On Friday evening Stickrod was the winner of a new shotgun by winning the “Last Man Standing” over several hundred competitors. Ashley Reesman and Anna Sommers finished 2nd and 3rd in the ladies portion of the exciting event shot in front of the main grandstands.
The Demons were not done yet as the nights final trophies were handed out for high over all (HOA) awards. These are presented to the teams with the highest combined scores from the top-five Trap and top-three Skeet and Sporting Clays scores from all of the 41 High School teams at the Championships. When the final scores were tabulated the BHS Demons added another large first place trophy to the case along with additional endowment money from the Scholastic Shooting Trust Fund.
Coach Denis Sommers was thrilled with the results and effort put for the by all the Demon shooters. “I know some of the kids are disappointed that we didn’t win the SCTP National Championship but they are still the National High School Champions and had the third highest score overall. We were only three birds away from repeating, that is quite an accomplishment.”
“Everyone in the SCTP knows about our team. I had two college coaches approach me during the week and say if we had any kids interested in shooting in college to let them know. That alone says a lot about the quality of our kids and our program.”
The website of the Burlington High School Demons Trapshooting team is: www.bhsdemonstrap.com
About the 2012 SCTP National Team Championships
The 2012 SCTP American Style National Team Championships were held July 17-21 at The World Shooting and Recreation Complex located in Sparta, Illinois where junior shooters from all over the nation competed for both team and individual honors in trap, skeet and sporting clays.
126 Teams with 1,557 Individual participants competed this year.
2,295 Total Entries with 1,229 Trap, 521 Skeet and 445 Sporting Clay participants.
There were 1347 Male competitors and 181 Female competitors.
SCTP is a youth development program where adult coaches and volunteers model sportsmanship, responsibility, honesty, ethics, integrity, and team work while using shooting sports programs to teach these and other positive life skills to SCTP athletes. To learn more visit the SCTP website at: www.ShootSCTP.org.
The Scholastic Shooting Sports Foundation exists to raise funding and other resources for Youth Development Programs in the shooting sports industry.
The Scholastic Shooting Trust Fund was created to raise money for shooting teams for high schools, colleges, and universities all over America. Over 20,000 schools in total!
Complete scores from the event are available online at: www.shooterspost.com