Bullseye! Beaver Area archers are shooting straight for states!

The Beaver Archery Team competes at the Pennsylvania State Tournament March 24. Currently, the high school team is ranked at second place statewide and is looking forward to scoring high at the state tournament.

States is usually held at the Penn State Main Campus, but this year it will be held at Spooky Nook Sports in Lancaster county.

The team competes through an organization called the National Archery in the Schools Program, or NASP. Over one million student archers from fourth to twelfth grade participate annually in NASP’s archery events.

The archery team has competed in six local tournaments this year, and has even hosted one of their own. Beaver Area’s Bullseye Bownanza State Qualifying Tournament began February 24 and ended the next day. This is the third year which Beaver Area has hosted a tournament at the school.

“Last year—being our first [recently] hosted tournament—we had some rough patches, but this year was a very big step forward. It lasted longer and we had more teams attend from other schools compared to last year. It really shows how far we’ve come as a team and as a club. Hosting a tournament this year was a great experience and I hope we do more in the future,” said sophomore Ryan Minnick.

Beaver Area placed first out of five teams with an overall score of 3,306. Senior Ryan Subroski placed first out of all high school boys with a score of 294. Freshman Manny Garcia placed second out of high school boys with a score of 289, and Minnick placed eighth with a score of 282. Senior Alexis Thomas took fifth place out of all high school girls with a score of 279, and Abby Moldovan placed seventh with a score of 277.

Beaver Area also placed first at the Portersville Christian School Tournament January 7, the Belle Vernon Tournament January 21, and at Riverside March 4. The team took second place at the Central Valley Groundhog Day Tournament and the February 17 Portersville Tournament.

The team has had a fast-paced winning season, and this momentum doesn’t seem to be slowing anytime soon. Looking ahead, the Eastern National Tournament will be held in Louisville, Kentucky May 11–13.

Preparation for large-scale tournaments is not much different from a normal day of practice for the archers.

“Obviously we go into these tournaments expecting great things, but problems arise all the time. So the best way, that I feel, to prepare yourself for states or nationals is to calm yourself down and breathe, because as soon as you let go of your focus, that’s when the bad things start,” explained Minnick.

Good luck at states next week, archers! Check the next edition of the BASD ECHO for the Bobcat archers’ state tournament results.