Mother Nature fires back at Cresco vs. Charles City/Nashua-Plainfield trap shooting meet

By John Burbridge

sports@charlescitypress.com

NASHUA — Trap shooting meets usually never cease fire, even when faced with a barrage of inclement weather.

Be it rain, snow, heat, cold, wind … perhaps even earthquakes.

But when Mother Nature starts shooting back in the form of lightning bolts, it elicits a compulsory retreat from the firing lines.

Tuesday’s meet between the Cresco Area Clay Crushers and the hosting Charles City/Nashua-Plainfield Trap Shooting Team at the Nashua Fish and Game Club was halted for a stretch when bursts of white-bright veins pulsated from storm clouds looming from the south.

Though the rain persisted between intermittent breaks, there was a respite of electrical activity allowing the meet to finish around 8:15 p.m.

When referenced as a metaphor for perfection, lightning almost did strike at the meet. Three times.

Three shooters almost achieved 50-of-50 rounds with a trio of 49s. Rockford senior Cole Cross, who shot for Charles City’s No. 1 squad, was one of them.

After missing once during his first 25 shots, Cross was completely on target throughout the latter 25-clay round. And with Charles City senior Taylor Quade hitting 48 to lead all female shooters, Ali Blickenderfer scoring 46 for the second-best female, Nic Bormann hitting 45 and Ty Hejna hitting 41 clays, CC1 shot one of the best squad scores (229) for the program this season.

For meet honors, CC1 got a subsequent challenge from CC2 consisting of Carson Linde (46), Carter Burkhardt (45), Harley Hinz (44) Cole Jones (44) and Wyatt Schradle (44) whose total (223) had them momentarily in second place.

But with the club’s flood lights illuminating the trap houses and the flight area behind them, CACC’s No. 5 squad stepped to the firing line.

With only a trace of rain in the air and the clays now blazing bright orange like orioles in flight, Ethan Tlusty and Kail Schmeizer both shot the aforementioned 49s with perfect latter rounds like Cross, Cole Suckow hit 48 after a 25-of-25 first round, and Cole Knight and Mason Vrbn each hitting 44, CACC5 won the meet with a squad total of 234.

If the night lights helped them or not, it must be noted that this same group of Cresco shooters recorded a squad score of 240 shooting in natural light at a tournament the Saturday before.

Arriving on a team bus with an impressive “armory on wheels” trailer in tow, the CACC is a formidable club which brought with it a legion of intermediate (junior high) shooters. The core of the team’s best shots, like the ones aforementioned, have been shooting together since sixth grade.

CC/NP started an intermediate program last season and has seen it grow to 18 members this season.

Normally, Cross, Tlusty and Schmeizer would engage in a shoot-off to determine first, second and third place.

“But we want to get out of here before 9 o’clock, so we decided not to have one,” CC/NP head coach Mike Oleson said.

Earlier, Oleson made a joke that if they were going to have a shoot-off that they should do it with the flood lights off.

“But then how could we tell if they hit or missed,” someone remarked.

Charles City’s No. 3 squad of Morgan McMurdy (44), Wyatt Parcher (44), Brady Hanson (44), Carter Soifer (43) and Hayden Heyer (42); CC’s No. 4 squad of Hunter Boehmer (45), Keegan Bollman (44), Everett Schmitt (44), Mallory Koebrick (40) and Avery Schaeck (39); and Nashua-Plainfield’s No. 1 squad of Nic Brase (47), Dawson Demro (46), Micaiah Groothuis (42), JR O’Neill (41) and Kyler Eskildsen (34) placed amid the Top 10 with respective team scores of 217, 212 and 210.

Four members of the CC/NP team  — Burkhardt, Cross, Demro and Groothuis — recently signed their letters of intent to sport shoot for Hawkeye Community College based in Waterloo.