UK Student Archery Association

SSS round up - Watt claim crown [28/Mar/22]

Delayed provisional results from SSS match 5 (held on 12th February) and SSS Indoor Champs (held 27th February - the day after BUCS Northern Qualifying) have now been published. Assuming these results stand, Match 5 was won by St Andrews, but Heriot-Watt's second place saw them take the overall SSS league title for the first time ever. The Indoor Champs - which does not count towards the SSS league standings - was won by Strathclyde, with Dundee a close second.

Both fixtures were WA18s.

In SSS match 5, St Andrews came out on top, but second place for Heriot-Watt was enough to ensure that they took the overall SSS league crown for the first time ever. St Andrews team of 4 WA18 total was 1815, with Heriot-Watt not far adrfit on 1791. Yohann Renault (St Andrews) scored 536. Strathclyde were third in the match on 1730. Aberdeen pipped Dundee to fourth spot 1610 to 1604, largely courtesy of a 550 from Rebecca Leigh, who top scored in the match outright.

Heriot-Watt ended the league season as SSS champions on 73 points, with St Andrews in second on 70. Aberdeen did enough to take third on 64 with Strathclyde in fourth on 61. The result is Heriot-Watt's first SSS league title and their first top 3 finish since 2010. They are also the fourth different SSS league winners in the last four competitive seasons. Lack of recruitment due to Covid has hit clubs all over the UK and SSS is noticeably weaker than in the before times. Heriot-Watt's 2071 was the highest team of 4 Portsmouth total recorded - a total that would have seen a club finish 4th, 5th, 4th and 4th (only just) in the relevant 2019/20 matches. Still, Heriot-Watt were in the same boat as everyone else and came out on top, winning 3 matches out of 5. Elsewhere in the league, Edinburgh fielded only novices in their post Christmas fixtures. Napier, who were champions in 2020 with a Portsmouth team of 4 average of 2196, had no senior recurves to field all season long. West of Scotland finished seventh in the final standings - their best finish in SSS so far.

Novice match 5 saw Edinburgh win with 1308, including top novice in the match Grace Goh's 455. This saw them confirmed as novice SSS league champions with 4 wins out of 5 and 74 points. St Andrews were second in the match on 1174 ahead of Dundee. However Heriot-Watt who went in to the match in second in the novice table were fifth in the fixture, behind Napier, so Dundee made up the two point gap, then nudging ahead of HW on aggregate by one single arrow value, 5,046 to 5,036.

In match 5, St Andrews completed the formality of a compound match win and winning the compound league title. Jake Walsh (Edinburgh) was teh top scorer in the match. His score of 589 broke the existing All Unis record by 1 point.

See the final SSS standings SSS 2021/22 page.

The separate SSS Indoor Champs was shot in St Andrews, the day after BUCS Northern Qualification took place in Napier. Strathclyde were the winners with Dundee close behind in second - the pair had finished 4th and 5th in the main SSS league. Euan Ogilvie (Strathclyde) was top scorer on 529. Aberdeen were third with Heriot-Watt in fourth. Dundee won the novice match by miles, with Alex Lai (Dundee) top individual on 480. St Andrews were top compounds again.

The SSS season wraps up with a mixed-club H2H event (in Strathclyde on Sat 26th Mar) and the Outdoor Championships (in Edinburgh on Sat 16th and Sun 17th Apr) held over the Easter weekend which will be a 1440 and 720/H2H.