CSU signs first student to clay target team

By Jan Joslin | May 24, 2021

Coach Thomas Cousins and Reagan Martin at signing ceremony at Barnwell High School. Photo provided by Martin family.

A signing ceremony for Reagan Graham Martin, the first member of the newly formed Clay Target Team at Charleston Southern University, was held at Barnwell High School in Barnwell, South Carolina, May 19.

Martin is an incoming freshman. Coach Thomas Cousins said, “Reagan is probably the best shooter in the state right now and is a great student to build a team around.”

Cousins is recruiting team members for the fall 2021 inaugural season for the club team which will compete in trap, skeet and sporting clays. Cousins, a physical education teacher in Berkeley County, was formerly the outdoor education teacher at West Ashley High School. “I started a clay target team at West Ashley about 10 years ago, and we had a lot of success and fun,” he said.

In addition to teaching physical education, Cousins coached football for 25 years and taught numerous outdoor education classes. He was named State Hunter Education Instructor of the Year in 2017 by the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources.

Charleston Southern becomes just the third college in South Carolina to offer shotgun sports, joining Clemson and USC Aiken.

Cousins said there will be no shotguns on campus at any time. Team members will have to take or have already taken a SCDNR hunter safety course and a gun safety course taught by Cousins.

Interested students should contact Tim Grant, assistant dean of student organizations, at tgrant@csuniv.edu.