The ASU club archery team hit a bull's-eye when five members competed in the Archery National Championship in Salt Lake City on March 10-12.
The team was led by the performance of freshman Lindsay Pian, who won the 2006 Indoor Archery Nationals.
"Lindsay is very dedicated and does everything she needs to do to be in the top of the field," coach Kari Granville said.
Despite being her first Indoor Nationals in the senior division, Pian won first place overall in the Western Collegiate division, first place in the U.S. Collegiate division and first place in the U.S. Senior division. Pian has taken home titles for the past three years in the youth divisions.
Also giving an excellent performance was sophomore Ted Harden, who took second place in the Western Collegiate division, fifth place in the U.S. Collegiate division and 17th place in the U.S. Senior division.
The performance was a repeat of the success the ASU archery club had before the sport ceased to be an NCAA sport at ASU in the early 1990's, due to the athletic department's decision. Until that point, the program had won more national titles (men's archery 15 times, women's archery 21 times and mixed archery 20 times) than any other athletic group at ASU.
The archery club then re-entered competition in the 2004-05 year. Now that the team has returned, they will immediately go back to the Papago FITA range to begin preparing for the outdoor season. The first outdoor tournament will be the 2006 Arizona Outdoor Championships on April 1-2, which will be hosted by Sun Devil Archery.
"It's some of our first shooters' time in the outdoors, we are going to use this tournament for experience," Granville said.
Rugby
The ASU men's rugby club fell short in their attempt to knock off rival UA, 30-20 Saturday on the band field.
The Sun Devils (7-5) wanted to put the disappointment of not making the playoffs behind them, but could not keep up with the aggressive style of play of their opponents.
"It was a tight game," junior Liam Kent said. "We played extremely hard, but I'm disappointed that we lost. We've got a really good set of people -- it's just too bad this was our last game."
ASU has its annual Alumni game Saturday on the band field. The Sun Devils will be looking forward to meeting up with some of their mentors from the past.
"It's good to meet up with past players and discuss the future of the program," Kent said.
The match up might not have the same intensity as last week's rivalry game, but all of the members of the club will be looking to go out and have some fun.
"Results are important, but I just want to enjoy the game," Kent said.
Reach the reporter at edward.price@asu.edu.
