West Virginia University won the air rifle team title at the 2025 NCAA rifle championships at the University of Kentucky’s Memorial Coliseum in Lexington, Kentucky, on Saturday, March 15. The Mountaineers posted a team score of 2388-210X to secure the air rifle win, led by senior Natalie Perrin and freshman Ashlyn Blake.
Across both relays, the top individual shooter for WVU in air rifle was Perrin, who posted a score of 598-53X. With 597-52X, Blake was not far behind Perrin in the individual air rifle standings. Perrin and Blake both earned spots for the air rifle final, with Blake finishing in third place with 228.9 and Perrin in fifth place with 185.7.
WVU’s score in air rifle was five points ahead of runner-up school Ole Miss, the latter posting a score of 2383-207X. Something to note: one Ole Miss Rebel, freshman Audrey Gogniat, topped the individual air rifle leaderboard going into the final with 600-58X, only two Xs from a “perfect-perfect” score. She went on to win the individual air rifle title after a dominant performance in the final that came down to the final shot, with Gogniat winning a tiebreaker against Kentucky sophomore Braden Peiser, 10.6 to 9.8.
Taking third place in air rifle was the host school for the 2025 NCAA rifle championships, the University of Kentucky Wildcats, with a score of 2383-198X. It was Braden Peiser who was the top shot for the Wildcats in air rifle with 599-54X, followed by junior Sofia Ceccarello with a score of 597-51X.
The competition was tight at the 2025 NCAA air rifle championship, with three of the top four teams—Ole Miss, Kentucky and the Air Force Academy—separated by only one point. As for the battle to claim seventh place, the University of Alaska-Fairbanks edged out Murray State University by only four in the X-count, 2371-191X to 2371-187X.
2025 NCAA Air Rifle Team Championship Leaderboard
- WVU, 2388-210X
- Ole Miss, 2383-207X
- Kentucky, 2383-198X
- Air Force, 2382, 198X
- Georgia Southern, 2380-189X
- TCU, 2377-183X
- Alaska-Fairbanks, 2371-191X
- Murray State, 2371-187X
In addition, WVU’s air rifle score was enough to propel the rifle team to the top of the two-gun aggregate leaderboard, giving the Mountaineers a 20th NCAA rifle championship victory. WVU entered the air rifle competition on Saturday 10 points behind in the standings.
See the full results of the 2025 NCAA rifle championships at the NCAA rifle website.
A full match report will be published in a future issue of the digital magazine.
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