Advertisement

Multiple young archers qualify for the NASP National Tourney

maxwell o'neill, the jamestown sun, n.d.
·4 min read

Apr. 1—JAMESTOWN — Out of hundreds of local boys and girls in the state from elementary to high school, a few local archers have qualified for the two National Archery in the Schools Program national tournaments.

Kids had to finish in the top 10 in their age group and gender to qualify for the national tournament.

One of the local kids that (WHO>>>>>>>) qualified for the national tournament in Louisville, Kentucky(COMMA) is Valley City High School senior Tyanna Judd who shoots for Barnes County North. At the state tournament, Judd shot sixth out of 113 high school girls and second out of 30 senior girls in the bullseye competition.

Judd said she shot as well as she did because she had practiced a lot and stayed relaxed, making sure she concentrated on keeping her breathing under control.

"I'm very excited," Judd said. "I'm really looking forward to it."

Once she finishes at the national tournament, Judd will continue competing in archery at North Dakota State University.

Judd is not the only shooter on the Bison team to make the national tournament as fifth grader Blayn Elston also qualified for the state tournament.

"He is a phenomenal shooter," said Jodi Schlenker, Barnes County North head coach. "So, we're pretty excited to see how far he'll go. I'm kind of guessing if he shoots as well as he has been, he'll place and go onto the championship which is in Myrtle Beach (South Carolina)."

Judd is shooting with the Bison while under the banner of Valley City High School because the Hi-Liners don't have an archery program.

"This year she didn't have a coach because they don't have anybody in Valley City," Schlenker said. "So, I was able to put myself on as a coach for Valley. She came out to practice with us but she shot for her own school. So, she also qualified for nationals in Kentucky."

The second-highest team in the middle school division was St. John's Academy which finished with 3,106 points in the bullseye competition. The school is sending multiple archers to the national tournament in Utah in both 3D and bullseye including fourth grader McKenna Lipetzky who qualified in both the 3D competition and the bullseye competition. Lipetzky finished first out of 51 fourth-grade girls who participated in the bullseye and second out of 40 fourth-grade girls in the 3D.

"There's a lot of excitement for the kids and for the accomplishment that they've made within the program," St. John's Academy coach Chris Althoff said.

Over both sides of the competition, the St. John's archers combined to score 4,546 points.

"We're thrilled that we have a club and we're thrilled with the performance of our students and the efforts of our coaches," St. John's Academy Principal Jeff Trumbauer said. "We're thrilled that they have the opportunity to continue on."

The National Archery in The Schools Program runs two national tournaments, one from April 28-29 in Sandy, Utah, and another one from May 11-12, in Louisville, Kentucky.

While the kids from St. John's Academy are going to the competition in Utah, Schlenker said her two archers, Judd and Elston are going to the one in Kentucky. Judd said she wanted to go to the competition in Louisville rather than the one in Utah because the competition in Utah has fewer participants than the one in Kentucky. There were 35 teams in the state tournament and at the national tournament in Utah there will be over 150 teams.

"The Utah tournament is about the same size as (the) state (tournament)," Judd said. "So there's not a whole lot of change and that was a new tournament. I believe it's only been around for four years. I really wanted to try going to a really big tournament, seeing what it's like just being there and getting to shoot."

After the national tournaments are over, the National Archery in the Schools Program takes the top 100 kids from the two tournaments combined to participate in the bigger national tournament in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

The highest-finishing boys' archer in the bullseye in the state tournament was Wahpeton's Jaxon Hill who had a score of 292, putting him first out of 345 total archers who participated in the event.