Last year’s champions, Jonesboro Westside, hope to claim a fourth state title in the senior division of the Arkansas Youth Shooting Sports Program this year (Photo courtesy of AGFC)
The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s (AGFC) Youth Shooting Sports (YSS) tournaments kick off this weekend with the defending state champion and many contenders battling for the title at the Arkansas Game and Fish Foundation (AGFF) Shooting Sports Complex.
Competition will be split among four regions with the East Regional starting off the competition with juniors shooting beginning Friday morning at 9 and senior high competitors following Saturday morning at 9. Jonesboro Westside, which won its third state title last June currently leads the competition. The East has 964 competitors, 106 squads and 43 programs spread across 13 fields at the complex. Other teams expected to contend for the title include Corning, Harrisburg, Cabot and Jacksonville.
Steve Johnson, AGFC’s new Youth Shooting Sports state coordinator says “There’s not a team in the East that I would call easy to get past. It’s a very tough region, and they work hard.”
The North Region will compete May 2 and 3 and includes perennial contender Bald Knob in the senior division. The West Region follows May 9 and 10 and the South Region rounds out the divisions on May 16 and 17. The top 64 qualifying teams from the regions by total score in both the junior and senior divisions will head back to the complex May 30 and 31 for the state championship.
Several contending squads in the YSS tournament recently played in the AGFF’s Trap Tournament earlier in April. Bald Knob recorded a 241 out of 250 attempts to win the senior division, edging Southwest Arkansas Leadheads by one clay pigeon. Manila’s senior squad managed to place third with 231 out of 250. In the junior division, Cabot Red ran up a 223 score out of 250 attempts, Camden placed second at 216 and South Side Bee Branch came in third with 207. Carson Nunally of Manila was the top shooter.
In the YSS junior division, up to five shooters per team get one round of 25 shots, with all five shooters contributing their scores to the final total. In the senior division, the five-person teams shoot two rounds of 25 shots. The top 16 squads in each region advance to state finals.
After the state finals, perfect score shooters will advance to the Champion of Champions event where they will shot at targets until only one shooter is left without missing a shot.
Jose Jimenez, the AGFC’s chief of Recreational Shooting Sports Division, commented on the tournament’s opening weekend saying “This sets the stage for what the season is going to look like. We look at it as one big hurdle that will set the season and everything else is downhill. We’re excited about it, and after many months of preparation, it’s finally here. It’s an agency event, and you can see all the different AGFC divisions represented. This is a huge collaborative effort, and, like the Archery in the Schools State Tournament, this is one of the biggest events in the agency. There’s a lot of pressure in that, and we look to be successful and perform.”
Admission to the games is free and concessions will be available on-site.
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