On Friday December 13, and Saturday the 14^th, the HHS archery teams set out to St. Henry High School to play in the 4^th Annual St. Henry High School tournament at the SHAC that was hosted this past weekend. On Friday, coach Tracy Houston set out with the team while on Saturday they were accompanied by their other coach, Matt Stuart. Due to the guidance of their coaches and a lot of practice, both the girls and boys had many high finishes in the tournament.

On the girls side of things, Sophomore Madison Opitz won 1^st place overall for the girls. Out of the 256 girls competing, Opitz swept the competition with a tremendous score of 285 (the maximum number of points that can be earned is 300) and also had one perfect round of 50. So far, Opitz’s score of 285 leads both the girls’ and boys’ teams for highest score this season. Other girls that consistently shoot high for the team are Sophomores McKenzie Opitz and Britton Bauer, and Junior Cassandra Erickson.

For the boys, the team was led by Senior Adam Groneck. After scoring a 278, Groneck ended up in 7^th place out of 313 shooters for the boys. He also had a perfect round of 50 during his weekend. Juniors Ethan Stuart and Liam Kinnaird also performed well for the boys this weekend, with Kinnaird receiving 271 points, just seven points behind Groneck.

The tournaments hosted were open tournaments, meaning that coaches are required to sign up individual athletes and not simply a team. When sign-ups opened, the HHS coaches raced to get as many shooters as they could into the tournament slots. Once the slots are filled, no more shooters can be signed up, making it difficult for large archery teams to all participate. They were also scored not as overall team rankings but by individual shooter, hence why there are no team results.

For those who don’t know how an archery tournament works, each shooter competing is assigned a “flight time” where they are to shoot. Each “flight time” lasts one hour, and flights occur all day~ usually from around 8 AM to 8 PM. During each flight, the shooters who are given that time have one practice round at 10 meters, followed by three rounds at 10m, then a practice round and three rounds at 15m.

Each round consists of five arrows shot and each arrow can be worth a maximum of ten points. A bullseye is ten points and each outer ring is worth less and less. A full miss is zero points for that arrow, and the archer does not reshoot.

When both Opitz and Groneck shot a perfect 50, that means they shot a full round of arrows in which every one hit the bullseye. Athletic Director Kevin Nieporte states, “Getting a perfect 50 is a rare occurrence and we are very proud of our athletes who accomplished that this weekend.”

Coach Stuart echoes Nieporte’s words, “This year’s team is a really good group composed of a lot of quality shooters. I set the standards high, but they always to their best to achieve them.”

Coach Stuart also reports that the team is training hard for future tournaments~ with reducing target panic being their biggest current goal. The team competes next on January 10^th and 11^th at Boone County High School.