Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 10, 1993 TAG: 9303100030
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: LEXINGTON LENGTH: Medium
NATION'S SHARPSHOOTERS GUNNING FOR NCAA TITLE AT VMI
Suppose they held an NCAA championship and nobody came.Imagine basketball's Final Four next month at the Superdome without spectators. That could happen this weekend at the NCAA rifle championships, which will have plenty of bizarre trappings, if not fans.
Virginia Military Institute, host for this NCAA shootout in 1982 and '88, again will provide the firing line for 56 shooters and nine schools Friday and Saturday. Individual and team championships are awarded, and seven schools double among the eight-team fields.
The small bore competition will be staged on VMI's range, with its 20 firing points in the basement of Kilbourne Hall, the ROTC building.
There's no room for spectators at the range, however. The air rifle competition will be held in Cormack Field House, better know as "The Pit" - which was the Keydets' basketball home back in the days when they could shoot.
This event definitely could be more than a small bore.
"I don't expect we'll have many spectators," said retired Army 1st Sgt. Jim Thorp, VMI's rifle coach. "Unless you're really into target shooting, it's sort of like watching paint fade."
Apparently, Thorp says things like that often. Sitting in his 8-by-10 office, located in the same room as the range, Thorp was asked if the shooting would be held "in here."
"Not in here," Thorp said. "This is my office. Out there."
Little wonder VMI basketball coach Joe Cantafio calls Thorp "a real pistol."
If a funny Coach Thorp who's not in the comics isn't enough, consider the potential Elvis sightings at VMI this weekend. The NCAA rifle chairman is Elvis Green, the coach at Murray State. His Racers have won two national titles, but West Virginia is to rifle what UCLA once was to hoops. The Mountaineers have won five consecutive NCAA titles and eight of the past 10.
In VMI, the NCAA has chosen not only one of the nation's largest rifle facilities, but a site with appropriate trappings. It is a place that once prompted a Keydets coach to remark, "Most schools get Parade All-Americans. We have Americans on parade with rifles."
The NCAA is promoting the event with a poster of a woman shooter - an interesting concept considering the host school's males-only admissions policy and its Supreme Court bid to remain so.
Rifle is one of three unisex NCAA championships, with skiing and fencing. With men and women gunning for the same success, three of the past four small bore and four of the past five air rifle individual champions were women.
Most of the shooters in the finals are Olympic hopefuls. Thorp said 58 schools have varsity rifle programs, a figure that's rising again.
"At one time, there were more than 100 schools with rifle," he said. "It dropped off during the '70s [in concert with the anti-military feelings spawned by the Vietnam War]."
VMI, which will not compete in the NCAA championships, is the only state school with a varsity program. The Keydets were ranked as high as 17th in the nation this season, but, scoring 1,150 out of 1,200 isn't always good enough.
Reaching the national championships can be the difference in pressure on a hair trigger, and there's no instant gratification involved, no cutting down nets or tearing down goal posts.
The teams in the NCAA championships aren't known until several days or more after the U.S. Postal Service delivers their results from various sectional qualifiers. Then, scores are compared, and the NCAA field that advances is announced. This year's sectionals, run jointly by the NCAA and the National Rifle Association, were held from mid-January through Feb. 21. The competitors who will be at VMI this week were notified six days later.
With only NCAA shooting at VMI this weekend, the competitors will know their scores within a couple of hours because of computers. Individual competition is scheduled Friday, with the teams vying Saturday.
This time, on the pock-marked hardwood of the old field house, gunning is perfectly acceptable. As the cadets used to scream at visitors, "Welcome to The Pit."
Bang!