Club rifle team wins second consecutive national championship

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The U-M Club Rifle Team returned from the 2014 NRA Intercollegiate Rifle Club Championships recently with another first-place trophy.

The team beat all competition in 2013, three years after its first national win in the inaugural championship, and repeated its success this year.

Since the 2013 win, the team almost doubled, from 16 to 30 members. That led to some logistic issues — the range where they practice can only accommodate 12 shooters at a time — but also led to more team unity and support, said Tyler Hughes, club president and captain.

Eighteen of the team’s members qualified in February for the national competition at Fort Benning, Ga., breaking the Western Intercollegiate Rifle Conference’s record for qualifiers from a single team.

At the national competition, each team enters qualifying individual shooters as well as a scoring team made up of its top four shooters.

Shooters compete in two competitions: small-bore, which uses a .22-caliber target rifle; and air rifle, which uses a .177-caliber target air rifle.

Michigan’s scoring team posted an aggregate score of 4,404, beating its winning score of 4,363 from last year.

Michigan’s coach, John Michael O’Connor, won Distinguished College Coach of the Year after Hughes and his teammates sent in more than 30 letters of support.

“With all the sacrifices he makes for the team — he volunteers his time for us, he’s letting me use his personal air rifle because I shoot better with it for some reason — he deserves it. His focus is on the team, and he’s very dedicated,” said Hughes.

Each year at the championship competition, two all-star teams are drafted by averaging the qualifying scores of shooters from all schools with their score at nationals. U-M shooters made up five of the 10 shooters on the air rifle team and three of 10 for the small-bore team.

“We have a great chance to three-peat next year,” said Hughes, who graduates in May but will return in the fall as an assistant coach.

From left, U-M rifle team members Tyler Hughes, Anne Sullivan, Ying Yi Liu and Aaron Ward shot on both the smallbore and air rifle teams. (Photo courtesy of Tyler Hughes)

Comments

  1. Rork Kuick
    on April 1, 2014 at 6:53 am

    Cool. Congratulations.
    Great image too, hinting at how fancy their gear is.

  2. John Bruce
    on April 1, 2014 at 8:49 am

    Very cool. Congrats!

  3. William Kerkstra
    on April 1, 2014 at 5:42 pm

    GO TEAM!!!

  4. David Davis
    on June 9, 2014 at 2:04 am

    Awesome weblog. I get so much details to the air weapon. Air weapon used so many different locations. Like war, capturing and protection issue. So most considerations is chose the most appropriate pellet gun for the different locations and the different uses.

  5. Sniper Man
    on November 4, 2014 at 7:31 am

    Guys, you are awesome! And yes, photo is great!

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