LOUISVILLE — Riding the best score of the week from sophomore Alanah Bryant, Anderson County repeated as champions at the National Archery in the Schools Program (NASP) Kentucky State 3-D Challenge that was held at the Kentucky Exposition Center.
The Bearcats turned in a score of 1,715 and won by nine points over Meade County and by 12 points over Madison Central. Those were the only three teams to surpass 1,700 points (in NASP 3-D events, a perfect score is 1,800).
It was a little closer for coach Shannon Ferguson’s program this season. Anderson County won last year with 1,732 points, well ahead of Bullitt Central, the only other team to exceed the 1,700-point plateau.
Anderson County also won the NASP 3-D title in 2018.
The Bearcats had 23 archers in the 3-D event as in NASP events schools can have up to 24 archers with the top six scores being used to form the ‘team’ score. A perfect individual score is 300. Each archer takes 30 shots and each arrow has a top value of 10 points.
NASP conducted two state tournaments March 28-30 in Louisville. There was the larger ‘bullseye’ event where archers shoot at traditional paper targets. In 3-D, archers shoot at life-size game targets.
The 3-D event was an almost perfect day for Bryant as the sophomore posted a score of 294. While NASP categorizes all scores in the three age divisions (elementary, middle school and high school) as one, Bryant was the top high school shooter with her 294, beating the 291 score of Bullitt Central freshman Natalie Hibbard.
Bryant had the second-best overall score as Luke Montgomery, an 8th-grader at Herald Whitaker Middle School, had the overall best score of 295.
Anderson County also had the number three high school girl as junior Courtney Moore also had a 291. NASP breaks ties based on the number of bullseyes. Hibbard had 23 while Moore had 21.
The other four scores that Anderson County used for its ‘team’ total was a 288 from sophomore Ryan Heng while junior Dalton Poole had a 285. A pair of seniors rounded out the top scores as Rylie Moore had a 279 and Damon Bowman a 278.
The other shooters for Anderson County in the NASP State Tournament were junior Ariena Cox with a 276; freshman Zachary Cummins with a 275; while 272 scores were posted by sophomore Anson Donahue and junior Breanna Woodside. Anna Ferguson, a senior, had a 271 while Gwendolyn Patton, a sophomore, had a 267.
The Bearcats also got 265 scores from Connor Glass and freshman Bralynn Gallagos. Freshman Harmony Dennemann had a 259 while junior Layla Prestenbach had a 257. Freshman Tatum Larson had a 254 and freshman Amber Willis finished with a 253. Rounding out the individual scores was a 236 from freshman Braeden Green, a 223 from freshman Dalton Fisher, a 209 from sophomore Jaxon Satterly and a 202 by freshman Hailey Sothen.
Anderson County’s archery program will now focus on the Kentucky High School Athletic Association state tournament on April 16 in Lexington. Unlike NASP, the KHSAA event have both boys/Co-Ed’ and girls’ divisions. The Bearcats qualified a team in each division.
The next major NASP event will be the Eastern Nationals that will also be held at the Kentucky Exposition Center the weekend of May 9-11.
Middle School 3-D
The Anderson County Middle School team also competed in the NASP Kentucky State 3-D Championships. In archery, all age groups shoot at the same targets from the same distances.
On Easter weekend, this Anderson County team scored 1,569 points and finished ninth among 60 middle school programs. The winning team was Harrison County Middle School with a 1,682 score.
The top score for Anderson County Middle School was a 270 by 8th-grader Tatum (ET) Larson while Luke Warren, another 8th-grader had a 268. The team also got a 264 from 7th-grader Adrianne Montgomery while 7th-grader Allen Patton had a 258. Rounding out the top six scores used for the ‘team’ total was 8th-grader Hailey Sothen with a 255 while 8th-grader Amber Willis had a 254.
Also shooting in this event was Gabriel Cruz with a 253 while Harmony Dennemann had a 247. Emma Toll scored a 242 while Zachary Cummins had a 237 and Malachi Spaulding a 235. Bralynn Gallegos posted a score of 227 while a 222 was scored by Sierra Robinson. The team also got a 210 from Dalton Fisher, a 209 from Cale Satterly, a 191 from Caroline Cooper and a 182 by Jacob Brown. Rounding out the ACMS scores was a 165 by Inayssa Garcia, a 154 from David Smallwood, a 133 from Brooklyn Godby and a 105 by Kyiah Richardson.