Mustangs Complete Championship Climb
October 15, 2016
By Tom Kendra
Special for Second Half
EAST LANSING – Macomb Lutheran North’s route to an MHSAA championship seemed like a simple 3, 2, 1 countdown.
The Mustangs, who finished third at the Lower Peninsula Girls Golf Division 4 tournament in 2014 and second last year, broke through with a 36-stroke victory over second-place Livonia Ladywood on Saturday at Forest Akers West in East Lansing.
But for veteran Lutheran North coach Lori Gill, the road to the title started much more than three years ago – last century, actually.
“This was 19 years in the making,” said an emotional Gill after leading Lutheran North to not only its first-ever girls golf championship, but also the first MHSAA girls golf title for any Macomb County school.
“You are looking at one happy, happy coach. This is a really special group of girls. They are fun, and they are committed.”
Lutheran North took command of the two-day event with a solid team effort on Friday, building up a 16-stroke lead, then came back with an even better team score Saturday to zap any potential drama out of the team competition. Kalamazoo Hackett, the two-time reigning champion, placed third.
Junior Serena Nguyen led three Mustangs among the top 10 individuals with back-to-back 79s, good for fourth overall on the long and challenging Forest Akers West course. Senior Sydney Martens (85-79-164) took sixth and sophomore Kaity Rittner (82-84-166) was eighth.
Lutheran North’s fourth counted score on each day was an 89 – from senior Madison Mohr on Friday and junior Grace Farquhar on Saturday – as the Mustangs were the only team in the field to not count a score in the 90s or higher either of the two days.
“The best part is that it was a total team effort, and we all came through for our coach,” said Martens while cradling the championship trophy in her arms. “Each year we were getting closer and closer. It’s just so nice that we took that final step.”
The battle for individual medalist honors was closer than the team competition, but the experience – and power – of senior individual qualifier Nichole Cox of Maple City Glen Lake was too much for the rest of the field.
Cox capped off a stellar four-year career by winning her third consecutive Finals medalist honor, to go along with a fourth-place finish as a freshman. Cox fired an even-par 72 in Friday’s opening round and overcame a couple of bad holes on Saturday to finish with a 78 for a two-day total of 150 and a four-shot edge.
Frankenmuth senior Megan Watkins and Kalamazoo Hackett senior Naomi Keyte shot identical rounds of 78-76-154 to tie for second in the individual competition.
“I hit my driver great both days – almost all of them were straight with a little draw,” said Cox, who blasted a 280-yard drive on Saturday on the 407-yard, par-5 second hole. “I’m proud of myself because I had two double-bogeys today, but I hung in there.”
Cox, who will play golf at Bowling Green, had three birdies in Friday’s opening round and none on Saturday. She shook off a four-putt, double-bogey on No. 5, her second hole Saturday morning, then started racking up pars en route to her “three-peat.” She became only the ninth girl in MHSAA history to win at least three Finals individual championships.
The closest pursuer to Lutheran North in the team race turned out to be Livonia Ladywood, which improved on its fourth-place Finals finish one year ago. The Blazers captured the second-place trophy behind the big three of junior Gabriella Scopone (83-83-166), who placed ninth, senior Lydia Cranmer (86-81-167), who was 10th, and senior Jordyn Rioux (85-87-172).
But this was Lutheran North’s time for a title.
Martens, the senior leader for the Mustangs who will play golf at Oakland University next year, said the team talked about staying aggressive in spite of its 16-stroke lead after Friday’s opening round.
“Sixteen strokes sounds like a lot, but it’s only four strokes for each girl,” said Martens, whose older sister, Samantha Martens, was also a standout for Gill at Lutheran North. “We are a long-hitting team, and we wanted to keep playing our game and try to extend the lead.”
Gill, whose team was playing in the Finals for the sixth straight year, said another key to the Mustangs’ terrific run over the past three has been playing top-flight competition from Division 1 and other larger schools throughout the regular season. Lutheran North made a statement way back in August by winning the 15-school Flint Powers Invitational, then provided the other bookend to its spectacular season Saturday with a 36-stroke runaway.
“We got a taste of that top three (the last two years) and then winning the title became an obsession,” said Gill. “The girls knew what they wanted to do and they did it. What can I say? They are an amazing group of girls and an amazing group of golfers.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Macomb Lutheran North’s Serena Nguyen fires out of a bunker during Saturday’s final round of the Division 3 Final. (Middle) Maple City Glen Lake’s Nichole Cox holes a putt en route to her third straight individual title. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)
T-K Making Good on Great Expectations
October 17, 2019
By Dean Holzwarth
Special for Second Half
MIDDLEVILLE – The end of last season gave the Middleville Thornapple-Kellogg girls golf team a pretty good idea of what the future might hold.
The Trojans finished runners-up in the Ottawa-Kent Conference Gold, fourth at their Regional and were returning everyone the following season.
“I think it gave them a taste of like, we can do this,” T-K girls golf coach Bob Kaminski said. “They just had to make some improvements.”
The improvements Kaminski felt were necessary to get over the hump came to fruition, and the team made strides in reaching its goals.
The Trojans won the conference title over perennial powerhouse Grand Rapids South Christian and finished third at last week’s Division 2 Regional to qualify for the MHSAA Finals for the first time since 2005.
The conference crown also was their first in 18 years, when they were part of the O-K Blue.
“Last year we played really well,” Kaminski said. “We finished second in the conference and didn’t manage to get through Regionals, but we returned everybody for this year and we just felt like if they worked hard then we could improve and do good things.”
T-K will compete this weekend at Michigan State University’s Forest Akers East Golf Course with a senior-laden group.
There are eight seniors on the varsity squad, with five among the top six. They’ve played together since middle school.
“We all started in seventh grade, and we all kind of talked about how we were going to be on the golf team together,” senior Anna Kaminski said. “We’ve all been pretty close for years, and so going through the entire high school golf journey together has been awesome. Our bond is pretty strong.”
Other seniors are Clair Jansma, Anna Harmens, Paige Willette and Maddie Shepard. Jansma has been one of the team’s best but did not play in the Regional, making the Trojans’ qualifying for the Finals even more impressive.
Junior Paige VanStee has the team’s lowest scoring average.
“Obviously, this feels great (to make it to the Finals),” Bob Kaminski said. “Four of the girls who played at Regionals are seniors, and they came onto the team three years ago as freshmen and they just worked hard. They’ve played really well this year and have had a really good season.”
A key factor in the Trojans’ success has been their ability to consistently drop scores.
From last year to this one, a steady decline in each girl’s scoring average has paved the way toward a Finals berth.
“We’ve seen a big jump this year,” Bob Kaminski said. “We actually looked at some stats, and a number of them improved three or four shots from what they were last year. It’s a hard-working group, and they’re always trying to get better.”
Kaminski has embraced the opportunity to coach his daughter, Anna.
“That has been a lot of fun,” he said. “It can be stressful at times because the role of a father and coach are sometimes vastly different, but it’s been enjoyable to watch her play and progress and get better.”
Anna Kaminski said the seniors were motivated to make their mark on the program and end the longstanding drought between Finals appearances.
“We came into the season kind of expecting to do pretty well,” she said. “We knew we had a decent team, and we thought if we could do well in the conference then we should make it to state.”
And Jansma said the team was determined to take the necessary steps to heighten expectations.
"We felt very motivated," she said. "We still wanted to have fun. (But) in the back of our minds, I think we were all looking to win it. We pushed ourselves, and we got the job done.
"It felt so satisfying to work as hard as we did and have it finally pay off. For me, I spent quite a large amount of time working on my short game, and I remember spending hours on the driving range. I was itching to get out on the course with all my teammates."
The Trojans won’t be considered among the favorites this weekend, but that won’t stop them from competing hard to earn the best finish possible.
“I’ve been trying to tell them to have fun and enjoy the experience, but they are a very driven group and they want to do as well as they can,” Bob Kaminski said. “Obviously you’re playing with the best teams in the state, so we don’t know how it is all going to end up. But they want to go there and compete and do the best they can."
Added Anna Kaminski: “I’m not trying to put up a certain score or anything, and I just want to go and have fun. There are a lot of good teams out there, but hopefully we’ll do all right and play our best.”
Dean Holzwarth covered primarily high school sports for the Grand Rapids Press and MLive for 16 years and more recently served as sports editor of the Ionia Sentinel and as a sports photojournalist for WZZM. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Allegan, Kent and Ottawa counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Thornapple-Kellogg’s Anna Kaminski watches an approach shot during competition this fall. (Middle) Junior Paige VanStee has been the team’s low scorer. (Photos courtesy of The Sun and News.)