FIELD TWP- About 500 youthful archers from 13 regional schools descended on North Woods School on Saturday for the second archery meet of the year, and the Grizzlies repeated their performance from the first meet, hitting the mark with first-place team finishes in elementary and middle school divisions and second in high school. Ely also had numerous archers place high in the individual division competitions.
North Woods Head Coach Emily Nelson said that the numbers were down from pre-COVID tournaments that would attract around 700 competitors. Many schools are seeing fewer participants after the long pandemic-inflicted layoff, she said, but participation at North Woods remains strong with over 50 fourth through 12th grade students participating.
With such a large group, Nelson needs plenty of help, and she has it. Four new assistants signed up this year, giving Nelson a total of 12.
“Each coach can help five or six kids at a time, so that helps a lot,” Nelson said. “You can really get more one-on-one time with those kids instead of having them all spread out. I think that’s why our numbers are so good, because we’re able to help the kids so much.”
With only two practices a week and meets every other Saturday, Nelson said they can also accommodate kids on the team who also want to play basketball.
Archery competition takes place under the auspices of the National Archery in the Schools Program, which specifies equipment requirements, establishes rules, provides for tournament results reporting, and makes instructional opportunities available. Nelson said that regional schools banded together a few years ago to establish a northeast regional group.
“I feel like we’re one of the better regions in the state because we’ve really worked together to keep it running,” Nelson said.
Pooling their financial resources, the group acquired the targets, bow stands, quivers, and additional safety equipment necessary to stage a large interscholastic meet, and a large trailer to transport it all. Nelson said that when everything is packed up at the end of a meet, the next host school takes the trailer along with them.
Unpacking and setting up a competition layout featuring 40 targets for the North Woods meet took about two-and-a-half hours on Friday night, Nelson said.
“I think that’s the fastest we’ve ever done it,” she said.
Archery tournaments are day-long come-and-go affairs where schools and students can schedule the times they’re going to shoot throughout the day, but it still takes a lot of volunteers to accommodate 500 archers plus coaches and fans throughout the day. Nelson said that Grizzlies parents were assigned three-hour working shifts, and student archers also helped when they weren’t competing.
Results
North Woods and Ely archers with top-five finishes included:
Fourth Grade
Female
1st- (204) Beck Sponholz - Ely
2nd- (191) Kaidence Scofield – North Woods
Male
1st- (253) Clark Danielson - North Woods
3rd- (230) Hayden Weidemann - Ely
4th- (229) Braden Jonas - Ely

Fifth Grade
Female
4th- (222) Michaela Brunner - North Woods
Male
1st - (261) Buckley LeForte - North Woods
2nd- (260) Brady Swanson - North Woods

Middle School
Female
3rd- (273) Sabrah Hart - Ely
4th- (272) Merilee Scofield - North Woods
Male
1st- (271) Lincoln Antikainen - North Woods
3rd- (269) Blaze Markwardt - North Woods
5th- (260) Talan Hart - Ely

High School
Female
1st- (286) Lillian Voges - North Woods