INDIANAPOLIS – For the first time in program history, the Georgia Southern rifle team will be represented at the NCAA Championships as senior Rosemary Kramer has been selected to compete in air rifle. The 2019 National Collegiate Men's and Women's Rifle Championships event will be held March 8-9 at WVU Coliseum and hosted by West Virginia University in Morgantown.

The air rifle portion of the championships will take place on Saturday, March 9. Kramer is one of four individual qualifiers in air rifle, as she will be joined by Alexa Potts (Morehead State), Hannah Virga (Nebraska) and Alec Patajo (Nevada). Each of the eight teams that qualified will also have their individuals compete.

"I have always wanted to go to NCAA championships, and part of me always imagined myself being there," Kramer said. "I have been shooting for nearly eight years now and have seen improvements, difficulties, passion and self-growth for each one. I am so happy that for my last collegiate year of shooting I was able to make my dreams come true. My coach and team have pushed me and taught me things I didn't even know I needed to learn. This is just my first step of many along my growing career in shooting; I can't wait to make Georgia Southern proud."

Kramer has been one of the top air rifle shooters in the country this season with a 593.364 average. She had a school-record 598 earlier this year and her 596 at last weekend's NCAA Qualifier in Charleston sealed her trip Morgantown. This season, she has finished first in air rifle at eight of the 11 NCAA events she's participated in and her season average is ranked eighth in the NCAA heading into postseason.

She becomes the first Southern Conference student-athlete to qualify for the NCAA air rifle since William Thomas of ETSU qualified in 1985.

"I'm thrilled and proud of Rose's performance both in the NCAA Qualifier and all year long," said head coach Sandra Worman. "But more so, I am proud of the team, who started this journey last year. We began in September 2017 with the intention to go to the NCAA Championships. Last year, that meant we went to The Citadel and volunteered to help Coach Smith however we could.  We arrived as fangirls, but we left with an understanding of how this top-tier match was run and we studied the elite athletes competing. After it was over, we sat down right there and made a list of how many similarities there were between the processes used by those competing and our own. We came away with the understanding and expectation that it could be like us to qualify for the NCAA Championships as competitors. While Rose is the first to qualify, our collective thought process was an acceptance that we have the resources, the work ethic and the tenacity to qualify in some way. I applaud that Rose absorbed that intention so completely, and never wavered in her confidence and commitment to making the list. I also want to applaud Courtney Weekley who also fully absorbed the intention, but whose promise and possibility involved a battle with an implacable injury. Both ladies have led the way and leveled up the program at Georgia Southern."

The Eagles were not selected to compete in the NCAA Championships as a team. They'll next be in action March 2 and 3, hosting the Southern Conference Championships at the Shooting Sports Education Center in Statesboro.