Colorado's governor asked the nation Sunday for prayers for the 17-year-old girl who was critically wounded by a classmate at her suburban Denver high school. 
 
 Sharon Adams looks through a 2013 Arapahoe High School yearbook at her home near the school in Centennial, Colo., on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013. The Adams daughter is a cheerleader at the school and escaped... (Associated Press) 
 
 A deputy of the Arapahoe County, Colo., Sheriff's Department walks next to crime scene tape in front of a doorway to Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013. The school was... (Associated Press) 
 
 Chris Davis, a senior who plays basketball at Arapahoe High School, hangs a sign to raise money for the victim in a shooting at the school in Centennial, Colo., on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013. Investigators... (Associated Press) 
 
 An Arapahoe County, Colo., Sheriff's Department deputy, left, talks to an unidentified man outside the west entrance to Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013. Investigators... (Associated Press) 
 
 Roses and a sign of support are woven into a cyclone fence around a tennis court at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013. The school was the scene of a shooting on Friday... (Associated Press) 
 
 Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson holds a picture of Claire Davis the 17-year-old student that was shot during a briefing Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013, at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo. Davis... (Associated Press) 
 
 Sean Sweeney, a runner who lives near Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., pauses to say a prayer for the victims and the gunman of a shooting at the school during his early morning run on Saturday,... (Associated Press) 
 
 The front door at the Highlands Ranch, Colo., home of the 18-year-old shooting suspect Karl Halverson Pierson is covered with plywood on Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013, after the police searched the home. Pierson... (Associated Press) 
 
 A parent picks up her daughter at a church where students from nearby Arapahoe High School were evacuated to after a shooting on the Centennial, Colo., campus Friday, Dec. 13, 2013. Arapahoe County Sheriff... (Associated Press) 
 
 Freshman Allie Zadrow, center right, hugs classmate Liz Reinhardt at a church after a shooting at nearby Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., on Friday, Dec. 13, 2013. Students from the school were... (Associated Press) 
 
 Gov. John Hickenlooper also credited security procedures adopted after the 1999 massacre at nearby Columbine High School for helping put a quick end to the Arapahoe High School shooting by Karl Pierson, an 18-year-old student who shot Claire Davis at point-blank range before killing himself. 
 
 "We all have to keep Claire in our thoughts and prayers," he told CBS' "Face the Nation." Davis is hospitalized at Littleton Adventist Hospital. 
 
 Davis is in critical condition and stable, but she is in a coma, her family said in a statement issued on the hospital's Facebook page Sunday. 
 
 "The first responders got Claire to the right place, at the right time," the family said. They also praised the care she was receiving and expressed thanks for the outpouring of prayers and support. 
 
 About 500 classmates held a candlelight vigil Saturday for Davis, who was sitting with a friend near the school library when she was shot in the head. Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson has said investigators think she was shot at random by Pierson, who had gone into the school looking for a teacher with whom he had a dispute. 
 
 Pierson may have been nursing a grudge against the teacher _ a librarian and head of the school debate team _ since September. Pierson was on the team and had been disciplined by the librarian for reasons yet to be disclosed, the sheriff said. He said Pierson threatened that teacher in September and came to the school Friday intending to harm him and inflict numerous other casualties. 
 
 Pierson excelled at speech and debate and was passionate about the team, friends said. They described him as a smart student who apparently didn't shirk from confrontations in class. 
 
 "He's a funny kid. He's smart. He's in the Eagle Scouts, a very intelligent kid. Did not like being wrong," said August Clary, who was a friend of Pierson. "If you're arguing with him, it's going to be, that's a feat if you win an argument against him." 
 
 "He would not be afraid to tell someone how he feels," said Zach Runberg, 18, a senior in Pierson's English class. 
 
 Pierson legally bought a shotgun on Dec. 6 at a local store, and he purchased ammunition the morning of the shootings. He managed to ignite a Molotov cocktail inside the school library before he killed himself as a fast-acting school security officer, a deputy sheriff, closed in, Robinson said. 
 
 That officer's aggressive response prevented more casualties, Robinson said. It's a tactic adopted nationwide after Columbine, in which first responders cordoned off the school before pursuing two student gunmen inside. The two killed 12 students and a teacher before killing themselves. 
 
 "It's nice to see how well the system worked. It's a remarkable improvement from before. This could have been much, much worse," Hickenlooper said. 
 
 After the Aurora, Colo., theater shootings and the Newtown, Conn., school shootings, Colorado's Democrat-led legislature this year implemented gun control measures that limited the size of ammunition magazines and instituted universal background checks. Colorado also appropriated more than $20 million for mental health hotlines and local crisis centers. 
 
 The measures were intended to address violence associated with so-called assault rifles, not shotguns that are widely owned for hunting and sport. 
 
 Hickenlooper acknowledged the latest shooting raised again questions about guns and violence. But he noted that Pierson "didn't seem to exhibit any signs of mental illness," and he cautioned that the investigation was in its early stages. 
 
 "Everyone in Colorado is asking the same questions," the governor said. "On the one hand there is a deeply held conviction for the freedoms laid out in the Second Amendment, but also a very, very strong conviction about the safety of children and the safety of the community." 
 
 Friday's shooting, he said, "defies any explanation, and you know we are searching for some pattern." 
 
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 Associated Press writer P. Solomon Banda contributed to this report. ||||| Students at Arapahoe High School should have been studying for finals Monday, powering through their last week of classes before Christmas break. 
 
 Instead, authorities continue to walk the school's hallways, piecing together the 80 seconds that terrified a community and left Claire Davis in a coma, fighting for her life. 
 
 Davis remained in critical condition Sunday evening, according to a statement from her family, who praised first responders and asked the community to continue thinking of and praying for the 17-year-old. 
 
 Claire Davis (Provided by Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office) 
 
 The senior was shot point-blank in the head Friday after she found herself in the path of Karl Pierson, who had fired several random rounds in the hallway before he shot Davis. Pierson, an 18-year-old senior, stormed into the school at about 12:30 p.m., carrying a pump-action shotgun, a bandolier of ammunition, a machete and three Molotov cocktails. 
 
 Seconds later, Pierson turned the gun on himself. Officers found his body in a corner of the library. 
 
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 Pierson bought the shotgun days before, part of a plot to avenge a grudge he had against the school's librarian and debate coach, Tracy Murphy. Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson told The Post on Sunday that investigators have spoken with Murphy extensively and are working to understand the relationship between the two. 
 
 "We're beginning to better define that, but at this point in time it's not something we're going to talk about," Robinson said. 
 
 Robinson and Gov. John Hickenlooper have credited the swift response by a deputy sheriff working as the school's resource officer during the shooting. 
 
 "This could have been much, much worse," Hickenlooper told CBS's "Face the Nation." 
 
 Hickenlooper also visited Davis and her family Sunday. 
 
 "We all have to keep Claire in our thoughts and prayers," he said. 
 
 More than 1,000 of Davis' classmates and other community members gathered at the high school's track Sunday to pray for and support Davis. The crowd, huddled together in black and gold, came to offer prayers, give hugs and try to understand why. 
 
 "It helps to see everyone's faces, to give them hugs," 14-year-old freshman Nick Atencio said. "It still has all of us reeling. It's important that we all come together." 
 
 Students stood in groups, and when words failed, hugs were used instead. Parents also came together, holding back tears as they described the short, terrifying text messages their children sent them from inside dark, quiet classrooms. 
 
 For many parents, the messages that were sent to reassure them — "I'm OK," "We're hiding and waiting," "I love you" — turned into rattling uncertainty. 
 
 "It's going to be hard when we have to go back in there," Atencio said, staring at the entrance Pierson used Friday. "I don't know what to expect. But it's a step we're all going to have to take together." 
 
 Balloons and well-wishes for shooting victim Claire Davis, 17, are attached to a fence along Dry Creek Road near Arapahoe High School on Sunday. 
 
 School officials are working to set up times when students may come and collect their belongings. 
 
 But the trauma of Friday's shooting will reverberate long past when students return to school and beyond the school's walls, said Dr. David Schonfeld, director of the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement in Philadelphia. Schonfeld traveled to Colorado to work with students after the 2006 shooting at Platte Canyon High School, during which 16-year-old Emily Keyes was killed, and the shootings at the Aurora movie theater, where a gunman killed 12 people and injured 70 others in July 2012. 
 
 Less than an hour's drive to the movie theater and just miles from Columbine High School, where two students killed 12 students and one teacher in 1999, the shooting at Arapahoe High School is likely to spark memories of trauma for those affected by past events. The emotional toll also may cause overwhelming feelings of grief for members of the community, Schonfeld said. 
 
 Students and staff members who were at the school Friday will experience a range of emotions, Schonfeld said. Many may begin to place blame on themselves, either for failing to stop the shooting or predict it. 
 
 "Whenever anything bad happens, people feel badly. But they also wonder what they did that was bad," Schonfeld said. "A lot of this comes from the sense that people would rather accept blame for what happened than to realize it's completely out of their control." 
 
 The Littleton Public School District has made counseling available for students. 
 
 On Sunday, students worked to comfort each other, including Davis. 
 
 Students hung a Christmas stocking for Davis and left notes at the tribute forming along the school's south fence. Their message — and hope — could be seen a block away. 
 
 "Pray for Claire." 
 
 Jordan Steffen: 303-954-1794, jsteffen@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jsteffendp 
 
 The Associated Press contributed to this report. ||||| NBC News Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson holds a picture of Claire Davis the 17-year-old student that was shot during a briefing Saturday, Dec. 14, 2013, at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo. 
 
 The 17-year-old girl shot point-blank in the head at a Colorado high school — who is being described as "one of the nicest people" — is in a coma and in critical condition, her family said Sunday. 
 
 Claire Esther Davis, a senior at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colo., was wounded Friday in an 80-second attack by student gunman Karl Halverson Pierson, 18, who walked in the building packing a shotgun and a grudge over being benched on the debate team, police said. 
 
 The victim's family had previously said she suffered severe head trauma, but provided more details on her condition Sunday and thanked emergency workers who rushed her to the hospital. 
 
 "Claire remains in critical condition. She is stable, but is in a coma," they said in a statement released through Littleton Adventist Hospital. 
 
 "The first responders got Claire to the right place, at the right time, and the doctors and hospital staff are doing a wonderful job taking care of her. 
 
 "We appreciate your continued good thoughts and prayers, and will provide updates as her condition improves." 
 
 Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson said Claire was just in the wrong place at the wrong time and that the motive for the shooting was retaliation against a staff member. 
 
 Karl Pierson had grown angry and made threatening remarks before he shot a student and himself in a Colorado high school. NBC's Ron Mott reports. 
 
 Debate team captain Joe Redmond said Pierson had grown angrier and angrier in recent weeks, and the target of his ire was debate coach and school librarian Tracy Murphy. 
 
 "Speech and debate was his life and the fact that he wasn't there crushed him a little bit and made him really tense and angry," Redmond told NBC News. 
 
 "Karl and Murphy did not get along and whatever it was escalated to a death threat. 
 
 "I did try to help him and didn't get to him," Redmond added. "No one was able to get to him. At the end of the day, that’s what happened." 
 
 Pierson showed up at school at midday Friday with a pump-action shotgun, ammunition strapped to his chest, a machete and Molotov cocktails — and headed for the library. 
 
 Alerted to the threat, Murphy left the building, which police praised as a tactical move to lure Pierson outside. 
 
 Pierson fired one round down a hallway and then shot Claire, who just happened to be sitting nearby with a friend. He killed himself as a security officer closed in on him, police said. 
 
 "His intent was evil and his evil intent was to harm multiple individuals," the sheriff said. 
 
 Redmond said he was trying to reconcile the cold-blooded crime with the teenager he knew. 
 
 "It's indefensible what he did," he said. 
 
 "The Karl that I knew was a good person but obviously the Karl who came into the school on Friday was not." 
 
 Murphy was not hurt. A statement from the Littleton Public Schools he had "asked asked that we share his and his family's concern for all of the victims of this tragedy." 
 
 Meanwhile, Arapahoe students are praying for Claire, who was described as outgoing, athletic and an excellent student. She loves horses and recently placed second in an equestrian competition, The Denver Post reported, 
 
 A neighbor told the newspaper Claire is also the best babysitter in the community. 
 
 "She took care of our 5-year-old," said one man. "She was well-loved. I believe she wanted to go into nursing — I know she had already been accepted to a number of colleges already." 
 
 Fellow student Avery Griggs, a sophomore, said she is "one of the nicest people I've met at Arapahoe." 
 
 "She is amazing and so sweet," Avery told the Post. 
 
 Friends and well-wishers posted prayers on Twitter, and some students collected money to help pay for her medical expenses. 
 
 "I feel like it's going to make us a stronger senior class and school as a whole," Chris Davis, an Arapahoe senior who helped organize the fundraising effort. 
 
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– The 17-year-old girl shot in the head in Friday's Colorado school shooting is in a coma and fighting for her life, her family says. Claire Davis "remains in critical condition. She is stable, but is in a coma," the family said in a statement. "The first responders got Claire to the right place, at the right time, and the doctors and hospital staff are doing a wonderful job taking care of her." The county sheriff says Claire was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time when gunman Karl Pierson walked into Arapahoe High School seeking to attack the debate coach who benched him, reports NBC. Police don't believe Pierson even knew Claire. Investigators are still trying to determine what went on between the debate coach and Pierson, who took his own life seconds after shooting Claire, the Denver Post reports. Classes at the high school, where more than a thousand people gathered for a vigil yesterday, have been cancelled today. Friends and family members describe her as an outgoing, athletic girl who loved horses. "She was just a very sweet girl. She's really smart," a classmate tells CNN. Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, who has asked the nation to pray for Claire, credits security measures put in place after the nearby Columbine High School shooting in 1999 with preventing the shooting from having been much worse, reports the AP.