Shotgun team takes home the gold

Home News Shotgun team takes home the gold
Shotgun team takes home the gold

The magic happens on a secluded, grassy field about six miles away from Hillsdale College on Bankers Road.

There, at the John A. Halter Shooting Sports Education Center, members of the college shotgun team prepare for competitions against schools many times  Hillsdale’s size, with programs much older.

And yet they win.

This year, through a competition restructuring that kept the team in Division III, it took home its second ACUI overall championship, hitting 550 of 600 possible targets in the six events, and winning gold in sporting clays and five-stand.

Combined, the team hit 20 more targets than the second place finishers. Freshman Jordan Hintz led the way, earning 3rd in America Skeet, 2nd in American Trap, and winning the High Combined American and Trap events.

“I won these individual awards that I never dreamed I would win,” Hintz said.

Coach Mike Carl was also impressed with Hintz.

“It’s about as spectacular a performance as you can get,” Carl said.

Other standouts at the national performance included freshman Casey Inks, junior Joe Kain, and freshman Kyle Luttig in sporting clays; Hintz, Kane, and Luttig in 5-stand; and Inks and sophomore Anna Pfaff coming close to the top 25 female shooters in overall scores.

This was hardly the young team’s first brush with success, however.

In 2012, the team, then not far removed from its founding by shooting instructor Bart Speith, won its first national championship at the ACUI Division III College Clay Target Championships. The next year, victory elevated the team to Division II, a higher level of competition. Despite the increased challenge, divisional novice status, and being one of the smaller contesting teams, Hillsdale still earned 7th place.

What accounts for this exemplary record? Hintz, also a junior Olympic competitor and Olympics aspirant (he’s aiming for 2020), credited in part the donors who make practicing at the pricey range possible.

“We’ve got Mike Carl, who gets us freshmen up to speed, Adam Burlew, and Bart Speith, who maintains the range,” he said. “And our team has the ability to practice at the nicest range of any college, since we’re the only college with our own range. It’s windy a lot, but that makes us better in the end, and it’s extremely important to our success.”

Carl himself attributed success to upperclassmen who weren’t necessarily recruited — yet still succeeded — along with specifically recruited underclassmen, and the great facility.

“Underclassmen leadership, the number of good shooters brought in, and the facility are what make this program unique,” he said.