Archery is newest opportunity for local students

Students from 12 schools competed in a February 11 archery tournament hosted by West Union High School. (Photo by Mark Carpenter)

Archery is newest opportunity for local students

For this writer, the knowledge of the sport of archery exists solely of the exploits of Robin Hood, Darryl Dixon and Legolas. But for those who are really familiar with the sport, West Union and North Adams High Schools are giving students their own opportunity to grab the bow and arrows and compete.

Saturday mornings are often busy and bustling at West Union High School and last Saturday was no exception. Cooperating with the teams from North Adams, WUHS hosted its second archery competition of the winter, this time welcoming 12 different teams and over 140 archers to the high school gymnasium, all set up with target, quivers, and distance marks.

The idea of archery in the ACOVSD is the brainchild of a husband and wife team, Brian and Tiffany Chitwood. Brian is the head coach of the West Union archers, while Tiffany heads up the North Adams squad, both in the districts where they are employed as teachers. It has been an impressive process to bring a new sport to the county and archery was approved as a school-sanctioned sport last May by the ACOVSD Board of Education.

”I used to teach at Mason County and they have had archery there for a number of years,” says Brian. “About five or six years ago, when I jumped ship and came here, I kind of brought the archery idea with me. The program that we run which is the National Archery in Schools Program, has been around for 15-20 years. The sport is up and coming here in Ohio.”

“This all started three years ago as an after-school club. I donated my time and then last year I was able to get a tournament team together and we had 42 kids involved. Right now between West Union and North Adams we have like 78 kids and starting next year, we will have teams at Peebles also, we’re running grades 7-12 at the moment. Next year North Adams is going to gt an elementary team going for grades 4-6. We are growing faster than our resources can keep up and last May 4 the board made it an official school-sanctioned sport.”

“Archery is not yet an OHSAA program,” Brian continued. “We’re like cheerleaders. They are considered a sports but not in the OHSAA. We’ve had over 30 kids qualify for state competition and I’ll be taking them next month to the Kasich Center at the state fairgrounds to compete. There are high school and middle school divisions.”

If you attend an archery event in the future, you will see a very organized and structured activity, always designed with the safety of the archers in mind. The times that the archers shoot are called “flights”, where archers are given three rounds at 10 meters and three rounds at 25 meters, adding their cumulative score from both. It’s bullseye scoring- 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2, and 1 and the competitors total each other’s scores, much like a golf match.

“Archery is big,” adds Brian. “We have more athletes than many of the other sports in the state. Archery is the perfect curriculum. It’s for every student. You can be in a wheelchair and still shoot archery, you can have one arm and still shoot archery. We have kids that are basketball players and kids who are putting on a school jersey for the very first time to compete. I have students with autism who shoot well, disabilities are not an issue.”

One of the basketball players that Brain mentioned is North Adams senior Lane Martin, seen as #12 on the Green Devils roster, but also ranked #7 in the state in archery.

“I got started in the sport of archery when I was about five years old when my father bought me a bear scout, which is a youth compound bow,” explained Martin. “I was crazy about bow hunting and still am. As the years went on, I upgraded bows and continued to shoot for fun in my free time. I learned about the school archery program last year from my Mom and told her I’d like to try out. I found out this fall where the sign ups were and joined the team.”

On being #7 in the state, Martin says, “It doesn’t seem real. It makes me feel accomplished and I never dreamt that I would be shooting for state rankings.”

“My husband had a four-wheel accident and broke his ankle and foot,” says Tiffany Chitwood. “So he had surgery and couldn’t drive so I had to take him to the archery coaches training. I’m not driving you all this time, so just sign me up for the training too to become B.A.I. certified (basic Archery Instructor). I take the course and I shot a bow for the first time in my life and because of the instruction I had, I was able to hit the target. I can actually even shoot both left and right handed. The old coach at North Adams left and I stepped in as the coach. That’s how I got involved in all of this, all because of a four-wheeler accident.”

“This program does wonder for some of these kids’ self-esteem. A lot of the kids say they are going to stick with archery because they feel like they belong to something.”

“We are blessed to have the community’s support but are always in need of more equipment,” Tiffany continued. Please contact Brian or myself if you are interested in helping. Our parents have also been extra supportive, helping set up and tear down and being line judges four the home tournaments. Angela McGraw from West Union has been amazing with her help as has Dana Fields from North Adams.”

The program thus far has gotten generous support from the following businesses: Whitetails Unlimited, First State Bank, Leonard Family Archery, AutoZone, Tractor Supply, Adams County Glass and O’Reilly Auto.

Here are the rosters for the archery programs in Adams County (who participated in Saturday’s tournament).

North Adams High School: Leeland Barry, MaCade Boyd, Leah Caldwell, Alaina Gaffin, Randall (R2) Dunkin, Cole Durbin, Liz Easterling, Paige Evans, Kendrick Fithen, Jocelyn Greene, Elizabeth Hawes, Kayla Hawes, Jasmine Hill, Land Martin, Robert McClellan, Dakota McIntosh, Mitchell Ohnewehr, Nathan Parks, Angela Pownall, Colten Richards, Tyler Richendollar, Kaitlyn Schumacher, Liberty Smith and Ainsley Thompson

North Adams Middle School: Zachary Bess, Journie Collett, Hannah Easterling, Kyleigh Fields, Joshua Fuson, Mason Lawson, Maddox Martin, Christopher Osman, Jacob Thatcher, Carly Via and James Work

West Union High School: Alex Bennett-Lane, Connor Caldwell, Christian Cooper, Ryken Copas, Andrew Creamer, Hunter Davis, Nathaniel Horsley, Aaron McGraw, Lea McNeilan, Sara Montgomery, Tristine Newman, Lily Randolph, Ronnie Smith, Joselynn Strong, Blake Thacker, Jasmine Traylor and Owen Yeager

West Union Middle School: Zeke Akers, Nevaeh Baldwin, Tristen Bales, Evan Ball, Clayton Davenport, Jason Hayslip, Zoe Horsley, Julie Knaiff, Addison Washburn, Jaxtyn McCarty, Greg Ross, Ella Shupert, Samson Strong, Veronica Sweet and Shane Tayler

At Saturday’s meet, North Adams High School placed second overall, West Union High School third and West Union Middle School second.

Individually, West Union’s Shane Tayler was second overall in the Middle School Division, while Clayton Davenport was fourth.

In the high school boys division, North Adams’ Tyler Richendollar placed second.

More information about the National Archery in Schools Program can be found at www.naspschools.org.

Location: 25 Rice Drive West Union, Ohio 45693 E-Mail: info@peoplesdefender.com Call: 937-544-2391 Fax: 937-544-2298