Fritsch Elementary School’s archery team took home the state title for the first time in its program history.
The Fritsch Elementary School Archery Team earned the highest marks for an elementary school in the Nevada State Archery Competition for the 2020-21 season.
The achievement brought the state title, trophy and honor home to Carson City for the first time in program history.
In addition to the elementary team winning the State Archery Tournament, Amelia Papez, fifth-grader at Fritsch, won first place overall out of all female archers in her age group and second place overall out of all female and male archers in her age group. With this accomplishment, qualified for the National Tournament to be held later this spring.
The Nevada State Archery Competition, sponsored by the
Nevada Department of Wildlife and hosted by the
National Archery in the Schools Program, is traditionally held in Las Vegas.
This year, however, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the tournament was hosted virtually. Rather than have a line of nearly 200-plus youthful archers gathered together, all releasing arrows toward down-range targets at the same time, NASP representatives attended, observed and judged each team from their respective schools.
“Putting an archery team into fruition during a year of COVID-19 had many challenges,” said coach Bethany Henry-Herman, NASP-certified and physical education teacher for Fritsch. “Fritsch’s Bulldog archers had to arrive early to school for practice shoots, abide by social distancing guidelines and were limited to practices due to COVID-19 restrictions.”
Fritsch’s archery team had 24 registered fifth-graders; however, only 18 were able to participate in the official tournament shoot. With the team win, each archer received individual medals and state champion T-shirts.
Students in grades 4 through 12 are able to participate in NASP and compete in the state tournament. They compete against archers within their own age group: elementary, middle or high school. They all use the same bow and arrows to maintain a level playing field.
In 2019, there were 136 active NASP schools in Nevada and 89, or 65.4%, of those schools were in Clark County. In 2018, 74 of the participating schools reported a total of 12,656 students participated in NASP programs that year. Of those, 10,548 attended Clark County schools.
“Vegas has usually dominated the Nevada State Archery Tournament,” Henry-Herman said. “This all would not have been possible without the help of our CCSD former teachers John and Laura Valley. John and Laura created an archery legacy and continue to ensure the program continues at Fritsch Elementary School. It has been my honor and privilege to continue the archery legacy the Valley’s instilled within the P.E. environment and competitive archery teams in the Carson City School District. We had a good group of very dedicated archers this year, and we are happy to bring the trophy back to Northern Nevada.”
Including Papez’s first-place ranking, Fritsch’s team did not fall short on other individual rankings. The individual rankings are broken down by female and male as follows for the entire state of Nevada tournament.
Females: - Amelia Papez - 1st place, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Molly Russel - 6th place, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Isabella Eisenmesser - 8th place, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Chloe Herman - 10th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Melody Gurkles - 11th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Rene Mellow - 12th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Masyn Ardinger - 13th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Saydance Kane - 15th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Hailey Miner - 16th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Mana Payan - 17th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Mackenzie Veatch - 18th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Morgan Holst - 19th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Olivia Garcia - 20th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
Males: - Gabe White - 4th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Owen Sarkissian - 13th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Noah Ramirez - 14th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Ben Crossman - 17th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
- Wesley Adams - 18th, overall, Nevada State Elementary Archer
