Simon Elfrink
Sports Editor
selfrink@murraystate.edu
Murray State rifle took home its 15th OVC Championship title on Sunday, Feb. 7, after defeating host Morehead state 4676-4656.
Head Coach Alan Lollar was excited to lead the team to its fifth title in six years. While the composite smallbore score wasn’t as high as he would have liked, Lollar was overall pleased with the results and happy to set the tone for Murray State Athletics in bringing home the first OVC Championship of the spring semester.
“I’m proud of them,” Lollar said. “They did a great job (and) Morehead did a great job hosting. We’re just happy we made it through the championships in this crazy COVID year.”
In tradition with the OVC Championship, the event was split up over two days of play, the first day being reserved for smallbore shooting and the second for air rifle. In smallbore, the Racers led the way at 2316 while Morehead State remained just within reach at 2304.
Sophomore Matias Kiuru led all shooters in smallbore with a score of 587. Freshman Allison Henry followed suit in third with a 580, while senior Dana Buessler was fourth overall after the smallbore competition at 579. Junior Emily Fitzgerald was the fourth best shooter for the Racers, placing 13th overall in smallbore with 570, while junior Anna Scheer shot 569 and placed 14th.
Air rifle yielded similar results, with Kiuru still coming in first at 597. Henry moved up a slot to second place on an air rifle score of 593. Buesseler dropped back to seventh at 585. Scheer also claimed a 585 in air rifle.
Based on the combined aggregate scores, Kiuru placed first overall in the competition with an aggregate score of 1184. Henry trailed Kiuru in second place at 1173. Buesseler’s 1164 aggregate score earned the Racers’ only senior a fourth-place spot in her last conference championship competition.
Buesseler said it was great to be able to share her last OVC Championship victory with her younger teammates.
“I think our team performed really well,” Buesseler said. “We had really good chemistry over the weekend. I’m just really proud of me and my team for coming together.”
Buesseler said her goal going into the big match was to keep her cool and perform at her best without thinking too much about the circumstances.
“It is my senior year, so I had a little bit of extra pressure on me to perform to the best of my abilities, but me and Coach had a lot of talks about doing what I do every day and not really trying to change up anything because that’s when I perform my best, whenever I’m just doing my own thing,” Buesseler said. “I wasn’t a rockstar or anything this weekend, but I did what I was supposed to.”
While Buesseler said the victory has the Racers in high spirits, they’re all very aware the season isn’t over yet. With competition ramping up for the NCAA Championship, the Racers have to see the season through if they want to qualify.
The Racers will compete next on Sunday, Feb. 14, against Jacksonville State before the NCAA Qualifier on Feb. 20 at the Pat Spurgin Rifle Range.