The University of Akron Athletics
#13 Akron Rifle Team Travels to Inaugural GARC Championship
February 26 | Rifle
AKRON, Ohio – The No. 13 University of Akron rifle team is set to finish up the 2014-15 season at its inaugural Great America Rifle Conference (GARC) Championship on Feb. 27 to March 1 in Oxford, Miss., at the Patricia C. Lamar National Guard Readiness Center.
Competition begins at 9 a.m. CT on Friday, Feb. 27. Akron senior Liz Berlin (DuBois, Pa.) will compete in a smallbore match at 11:45 a.m. CT.
Smallbore competition continues on Saturday, Feb. 28. Freshman Julia Hatch (Northfield, Vt.) competes at 7 a.m. CT, while junior Matt Chezem (Simi Valley, Calif.) follows at 9:40 a.m. CT. Senior John Hupp (Washington, Pa.) shoots an air rifle match at 11:50 a.m. CT. Smallbore action continues in the afternoon with matches for sophomore Zachary Strohl (Barto, Pa.) and junior Tim Hopkins (Olympia, Wash.) at 12:20 p.m. CT. Hupp competes in the smallbore at 3 p.m. CT.
In the final day of the championship on Sunday, March 1, Berlin, Hatch, and Hopkins compete in air rifle at 8 a.m. CT. Chezem and Strohl conclude team competition with their air rifle matches at 10:10 a.m. CT.
The GARC is made up of schools that have varsity rifle sponsored at their universities but not their universities respective conferences. Other schools competing this weekend are: Army, Kentucky, Memphis, Mississippi, Nebraska, NC State, and West Virginia.
Earlier in the season, the Zips faced most of these teams in the regular season. Akron compiled a 3-3 record, respectively. The Zips defeated Memphis, NC State, and Ole Miss but fell to Army, Kentucky, and West Virginia.
Last weekend, Akron claimed its second consecutive Western Intercollegiate Rifle Conference (WIRC) Championship during its final year of competition with that conference. The Zips competed in the GARC last year as an ancillary member.
