BUTLER TWP — Each day during the winter, about 40 Butler High students descend stairs to a room buried deep under the school.

They go down there to shoot — not pool, not basketballs, not hockey pucks — but guns. Big guns.

Butler is one of just 12 rifle teams in the WPIAL. The program has been firing away for more than four decades and is showing no signs of running out of ammunition.

“We have 41 kids on the team,” said Butler rifle coach Eric Beveridge, who is in his seventh year at the helm. “During our open gym, the first day, there were 90-some who showed up.”

Why is rifle so popular? Beveridge said the reason is a simple one.

“This is a thing anyone can do,” he said. “You don't have to be big. You don't have to be strong. You don't have to be fast. All you need is concentration. You don't have to concentrate for an hour, just 15 seconds at a time for 15 minutes, basically.”

A shooter does have to be patient and be willing to accept failure.

It also helps to be calm, cool and collected — and to know when and how to breathe.

The target they are trying to hit from 50 feet away to earn a perfect score — a coveted 10x — is a little smaller than the diameter of a dime.

Hitting one is hard enough. Hitting all 10 targets in the bull's-eye in a mere 15 minutes is downright difficult.

“It's not easy, that's for sure,” said senior Dana McCurdy.

Shooters can earn points for getting close to dead center. But it's not the same as that perfect 100-10x score.

McCurdy has a box at home filled with her most prized targets, some of them perfect.

“Shooting 100s, that's the most fun part, hands down,” McCurdy said. “When you shoot well, you feel good about yourself. I've shot 100-10x before. That target makes you proud and you hang that one on the fridge for everyone to see.”

Butler has a wall of fame where shooters can hang the targets they are most proud of. There's also a wall of shame where competitors can hang their not-so-perfect scores.

“Some people will hit nine targets and then completely miss the 10th,” McCurdy said. “Those are the ones that hurt the most. So, we hang them here.”

McCurdy was an avid hunter before she joined the rifle team as a freshman.

Hunting deer and putting a small target in your sights are completely different things, she said.

“A deer is a whole lot bigger than a target,” McCurdy said, laughing. “It's completely different.”

Beveridge said he gets many shooters who are hunters.

“We fight a unique problem here at Butler because most everyone hunts,” Beveridge said. “They think, ‘We're just shooting a rifle. No problem.' That's the biggest battle we have with the new kids. Yes, you can shoot, but this is a little different. This is a lot more precise.”

Senior Kayla Goas didn't have that problem. When she joined the team, she had never shot a rifle or a gun before.

Goas said she joined the team because it looked like fun and her father promised to buy her a letterman's jacket if she made the team and earned a letter.

“I loved it right away,” she said. “Even now it still feels weird some days to hold the rifle and shoot it. Then one day it feels completely natural. It's a day-to-day thing.”

The hardest thing for Goas to learn was positioning and breathing.

Shooters lay in a prone position, stare through a scope at their target and then try to concentrate and relax before gently squeezing the trigger.

“It's a huge mental thing,” Goas said. “The breathing. The being calm. The relaxing. If you have anything on your mind besides this, you aren't going to do well.”

No matter how well the team shoots, the biggest priority is safety.

In the 40-plus year history of the program, Butler has never had an injury.

“Safety is No. 1,” Beveridge said. “At the beginning, we spend the first day on safety. We instill in them that they are all in charge of the range and they have the ability to speak up at any time if they see something unsafe. We have a policy where any kids can be eliminated at any time. We've never had an accident and we never want one.”

It isn't cheap to run a rifle program.

Beveridge estimates that the team goes through approximately 33,000 rounds of .22 bullets every season.

“We run the budget pretty close,” he said.

Beveridge said the program received $4,000 from the school and he receives another $3,000 in grant money from the National Rifle Association each year.

“We have a great boosters club, too,” Beveridge said. “If we ever run short on money, they usually come through.”

Only nine kids shoot at one time. That leaves a lot of time to socialize.

That makes the rifle team a very close-nit group.

“We're one big family,” McCurdy said. “We shoot guns for two hours. What can be better?”