Ben Murphy
Sports Scene
The Freeland girls varsity golf team competed in the state finals October 14 and 15, taking 13th place in the Division 4 meet held at Forest Akers East Course at Michigan State University.
“All things considered, I think it went pretty well,” fifth-year head coach Mike Ritt said. “We finished about like I expected.”
The Falcons, who were competing in their third state final in the last four years, carded a team score of 427 on the first day, before dropping their score to a 414 on day two.
“The weather conditions weren’t the greatest, everybody struggled a little bit the first day,” Ritt said. “The second day was worse weather-wise, but the girls made a 13-stroke improvement, and I was really pleased with that. That was probably the biggest improvement of all the teams from one day to the next.”
At the meet, junior Tara Padgett shot scores of 101 and 97, sophomore Janna Brown shot scores of 107 and 101, junior Mollie Daly carded scores of 109 and 107, freshman Katie Morrissey came in at 110 and 109 and freshman Tori Argyle scored 111 and 122.
Without a single senior on the team, Ritt wasn’t sure what to expect from his team coming into the season.
“We were extremely young,” he said. “I really kind of thought that we might hang around third place in our own conference.”
Instead, the Falcons dominated the second half of the Tri Valley Conference jamboree meets to take their fourth consecutive league title.
“The girls really made huge strides after about the fourth jamboree on,” Ritt said. “We won the last five of them, so we were able to win conference. Once we started doing that, I thought we might have a good shot of making it to states.”
The Falcons took second place, behind Powers Catholic, at their regional October 7 at the Fortress in Frankenmuth to advance to the state finals.
“I just think that they really wanted to improve,” Ritt said. “The two captains (Padgett and Daly), they didn’t want to be the link that broke the chain of consecutive conference championships. I just think we had a group of girls that wanted to get better. Their will and want to get better was what put them over the top.”
With all five of the team’s members that played in the state finals returning next year, Ritt is hopeful that the Falcons will once again be a threat, not only at the conference level, but also at the state level.
“I know that Frankenmuth is going to be improved, and Chesaning was somewhat young too, but I feel we will be much better next year, too,” he said. “Last year Tara spent the summer playing in some tournaments, I’m sure she will do that again this year, too. Hopefully with the way things have gone, some girls will pick up on that and go play with her a little.”