The morning of Tuesday, Jul. 27 at the Tokyo Olympics saw Mary Tucker and Lucas Kozeniesky take the silver medal in the new 10-meter mixed team rifle event after a hard-fought match against Chinese shooters Yang Qian and Yang Haoran, who won the gold 17-13. The victory bumped up USA Shooting's total 2021 Games medal count to four.
Guaranteed a medal heading into the final, the duo of Tucker and Kozeniesky were down 1.7 points to Qian and Haoran after the qualification matches.
In the final, China secured an early 4-2 lead over Team USA, but strong shooting from Tucker and Kozeniesky put them in the lead 7-5. China took a time out and Team USA continued to widen the gap with a 9-5 lead. Next, China came back to tie the U.S. shooters at 11 after the first 16 visits to the firing line.
Although Tucker and Kozeniesky pulled within two points to raise the possibility of a winner-take-all final shot, in the next round they shot 19.8, which was not enough to take down their opponents.
This year marked the debut of the mixed team rifle event, which has two qualifying rounds before medal matches for gold and bronze. In addition to Tucker and Kozeniesky, Team USA's Alison Weisz and men's air rifle gold medalist Will Shaner performed well in the qualifiers but did not reach the finals.
As mentioned, Tucker and Kozeniesky's silver medal brings the total count of U.S. shooting medals in Tokyo to four, which is one ahead of the Rio 2016 medal haul. U.S. shooters Amber English and Vincent Hancock swept the skeet events on Monday, while William Shaner won the first 2021 U.S. shooting medal with an air rifle gold on Sunday.
Interested in watching Team USA's talented shooters live in Tokyo? Next up for USA Shooting at the Tokyo Olympics are the rifle and pistol qualification matches on Thursday, Jul. 29, which you can watch live beginning at 1:30 a.m. EST. Get the latest info about the Games by subscribing to the free Insider newsletter.
All photos by USA Shooting.
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