By Chad Koenen

Publisher

The New York Mills trap team knew the assignment. After their second week in competition, the Eagles continue to hold the lead in their conference—by over 3,000 points.

The points are determined by true team scoring.  The higher the score, the more points a team can get. For example, a perfect score of 50 gets 248 points, a score of 48 gets 241.50 points, a score of 45 gets 208 points, a score of 40 gets 153 points and a score of 30 gets 51 points and down the line until 0. So the better the score for each team member, the more points a team can get.  

Head coach Tom Kotarski said it’s pretty obvious NY Mills has some great trap shooters on their team.

Jacob Guck is currently in the “Top 25 Overall” in the state,  ranked 13th, with a 24.25 average.    

After the second week of competition, NY Mills has 12 male team members in the “Top 25 Males in the conference.” Ranked first is Jacob Guck with a 24.25 average, ranked second is Jack Peeters and Simon Snyder with a 24 average, ranked fourth is Cody Barthel, Sawyer Wedde and Nathan Fischer with a 23.75 average, ranked 11th is Monte Briard and Braxton Ehnert with a 23.25 average, ranked 19th is Will Oakes and Bode Roberts with a 22.75 average and ranked 24th is Preston Gordhammer and Henry Oakes with a 22.5 average.

The “Top 25 Females in the conference” rankings are also great with seven of NY Mills’ female members on the list. Ranked first is Megan Riedel with a 22.25 average, ranked fourth is Kailey Keskitalo with a 21 average, fifth is Jaida Newborg with a 20.5 average, sixth is Kaitlyn Geiser with a 20.25 average, ninth is Kelsey Knickrehm with a 19.25 average, 13th is Izzy Nesland with a 18.75 average and 25th is Kaydi Mursu with a 16 average.

After the first week, conference standings weren’t announced until later in the week and when they were Kotarski said the team was very pleased with being in first place by almost 2,000 points. 

Then week 2 started off on Monday with freezing and windy temperatures, but the Eagles were resilient and still shot and had some good scores come in.  Wednesday’s weather was much better and it showed as NY Mills had five perfect rounds of 25 straights shot on Wednesday. They were shot by Braxton Saewert, Jack Peeters, Simon Snyder, Megan Riedel and Jacob Guck.    This was Riedel’s first perfect score—she was all smiles.

Kotarski said the Eagles have some great teamwork. Whenever some of their scores go down, they have others who step up and puts up a high score to help the team. “Everyone” is in competition in three ways—with themselves to beat their own best score and have a perfect round, to do better than their teammates so they can win the top gun trophy at the end of the season, and, of course, to win their conference as a team.    

The top 5 NY Mills scores for the week:

49- Jack Peeters – High Gun

48- Cody Barthel, Jacob Guck, Simon Snyder

47- Monty Briard, Megan Riedel, Sawyer Wedde

46- Braxton Ehnert, Braeden Peterson

45- Nathan Fischer, Braxton Saewert, Zander Schmitt

Week 1 Week 2

Total Standings

  New York Mills High School

6,490.00 5,999.50 12,489.50

  Spring Lake Park High School

4,523.50 4,725.50 9,249.00

  Triton High School 4,366.00

4,834.50 9,200.50

  Rockford High School 4,059.00

4,183.00 8,242.00

  St. James High School 4,242.50

3,415.50 7,658.00

  Parkers Prairie High School

2,392.50 3,346.50 5,739.00

  Plainview-Elgin-Millville High 

School 2,938.50 2,696.00 5,634.50

  Northern Freeze Trap Team

1,864.00 1,675.50 3,539.50