MACHIAS – The pair of Down East police officers who represented Washington County on Saturday in a national shooting finale in Montana finished third in the competition.

Rodney Merritt of the Washington County Sheriff’s Department and Jason “Jake” Scott of the Machias Police Department won $25,000 worth of law enforcement gear for finishing third against two other teams in the 5.11 Tactical Challenge.

The pair from Raleigh, N.C., took first with a score of 1,460 points, followed by the pair from the Dallas Police Department with 1,372 points.

Merritt and Scott were third with 1,298 points.

Merritt told his co-workers in phone calls from Montana that the law enforcement competition was “top gun.”

Back home, Sheriff Joseph Tibbetts called the men winners.

“They competed valiantly,” Tibbetts said Tuesday. “They demonstrated that police officers from Maine are very well-trained. We have a fantastic firearms program here.

“We don’t have any reason to feel let down. They were winners before they went out there. They proved that noncombat shooters from Maine can compete with competition shooters.”

The Raleigh team returns home with $100,000 worth of gear and the Dallas team received $50,000 worth.

In finishing third, Merritt and Scott gained the assurance that the competition’s organizer will visit Machias next month to meet the sheriff and deliver $25,000 worth of gear to his officers. That’s enough to outfit 50 officers here.

“We want to meet the top cops in Machias and tell them what a great job their guys did in representing their departments,” organizer Bill Berry said in an e-mail Tuesday.