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Eagles Close with Round to Remember
June 15, 2013
By Dean Holzwarth
Special to Second Half
ALLENDALE – Grand Rapids Christian's Ken Bokhoven has been coaching boys golf for more than three decades.
But it wasn't until Saturday afternoon that the longtime coach had the opportunity to celebrate an MHSAA title.
The Eagles captured their first championship in program history with a six-shot win over Marshall in the Lower Peninsula Division 2 Final at The Meadows at Grand Valley State.
Grand Rapids Christian carded a two-day score of 636. It followed up Friday's 315 with a 321 in the final round.
Overall, combined with track and field, Bokhoven has been guiding athletes at the Grand Rapids-based private school for 51 years.
“He's coached for 51 years, and this is his first, so I can't imagine how he is feeling right now,” said Grand Rapids Christian junior Ben VanScoyk, who shot rounds of 75 and 78 to close at 153 and in a tie for fourth overall.
“It's definitely special, and we wanted to win for Coach with all he's been through. He's been through a lot in his life, and he's showed so much dedication to Christian High and athletics. It's special knowing that Coach can finally have something to lean on for golf and his first one.”
Bokhoven, who was doused with a water cooler after the round, tried to keep his team focused on the task at hand despite charging to a six-stroke lead after the first day.
“My pep talk consisted of, 'guys, go make some memories',” Bokhoven said. “I'm excited, and this is about as excited as I get. But in golf you have to stay relaxed and even-keel. It worked out well for us, and anytime you set a goal and you achieve that goal, it's rewarding. You feel like this is reaping the rewards of your efforts.”
The Eagles' previous top finish at an MHSAA Final was third in 2010. Bokhoven believed this year's team had the potential to make a serious run after winning a Regional title the week before.
“Five Regional champions come here, and I told the kids that we can compete,” Bokhoven said. “We came in thinking we could be in the hunt, and I told them after the first day on the way home that we're the hunted now. We are not in the hunt.”
Grand Rapids Christian's roster contained only one senior, Tom Voskuil. Five of its top six players will be back next season.
“Being a senior, I'm not going to lie, it's an emotional day for me,” Voskuil said. “Just because golf is a sport that is all about putting in the work, and I'm not playing in college so this is it for me.
“We didn't know if we had a chance coming into this tournament because some of the teams here were historically good, and we were surprised we were up by six after day one. We just had to hold on, and we were able to do that.”
Marshall shot 642 after rounds of 322 and 320. Juniors Aaron McCoy and Tanor Blowers each shot 159 to lead the team.
“We're disappointed, but I'm happy for Grand Rapids Christian because talking to their athletic director, he said it’s their first championship ever, so I know how that feels and that's good stuff,” Marshall coach Thomas Reynolds said. “I knew we had a shot at it, but this golf course is so hard. It was a nightmare, and we normally shoot around 310 to 320 as a team. Did they play to their potential? It's kind of hard to say with this golf course.”
Comstock Park junior Ryan Bayer, playing in his first MHSAA Final, overcame a triple-bogey en route to a stunning debut and an MHSAA individual title.
Bayer fired a 2-over 74 in the final round and defeated defending individual champion Nick Carlson of Hamilton by two strokes.
“It feels great, and I'm so happy,” said Bayer, who shot 75 Friday and finished at149. “I didn't even think about something like this, and I just wanted a couple solid rounds. I was nervous halfway through because I knew it was going to be close.
“I knew I would be up there, but I wasn't expecting to be all the way at the top.”
After the triple on the par-3, 17th-hole, Bayer rebounded to drain a 20-foot putt for par on No. 18. He capped his round with a 25-foot birdie putt on his final hole.
“I thought that was going to win it for me, but I ended up winning by two shots,” Bayer said. “It was like frosting on top of the cake. I played steady all day.”
Carlson shot a 4-over 76 Saturday for a 151 total. He won last year's individual title as a freshman at Katke Golf Course in Big Rapids.
“I had a shot, and a darn good one at that. I just needed to play a little better and have some different things happen,” Carlson said. “I didn't play to my potential, and I could've played a lot better. But coming out here and taking second trying to defend was pretty cool.”
PHOTOS: (Top) A Grand Rapids Christian player fires a shot during his team's round Saturday at The Meadows at Grand Valley State. (Middle) The Eagles pose with their first MHSAA team title trophy. (Click to see more at HighSchoolsSportsScene.com.)
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Lumen Christi Lives up to Links Tradition
By
Chip Mundy
Special for Second Half
June 9, 2016
By Chip Mundy
Special for Second Half
JACKSON – Every city has things for which it is known. Jackson is no different.
Jackson is the birthplace of the Republican Party.
It claims to have originated –and perfected – the Coney Island hot dog.
And Jackson is home to some really great golf.
Just what makes Jackson such a great golf town?
“Maybe it’s the water,” Jackson Lumen Christi boys coach Dave Swartout said with a smile. “I think the fact that there are 20 courses in the county certainly helps. So anybody who is young and wants to play golf has the opportunity, and luckily for a lot of people in this area, especially as juniors, you can play golf for not a lot of money. It’s not as expensive of a sport as some people might think it is.”
According to the National Golf Foundation’s annual report this year, Jackson is second in the state to Monroe and 12th in the country for 18-hole golf courses per capita. And that has led to some sensational golf out of Jackson on the high school level.
Dating back to 1937, when Jackson High School won the Class A title, Jackson County boys golf teams have totaled 30 MHSAA Finals boys championships, led by Lumen Christi, which has 14. Lumen Christi also has won four girls golf titles.
“I play golf almost every day,” Lumen Christi senior Will Double said. “It does help when you have the availability to play different courses every day and play different holes.”
The Titans appear to be in the mix for another title. They are ranked No. 2 in Lower Peninsula Division 3 going into this weekend’s championship tournament at Forest Akers East on the campus of Michigan State University. Lumen Christi is coming off its 11th consecutive Regional championship last weekend.
“I really think we have a realistic chance to win it, but I’ve said that the last five years, too, and we’ve finished second and third,” Swartout said.
History of success
Lumen Christi has won an MHSAA-record 14 Finals championships in boys golf. But that doesn’t tell the whole story. Lumen Christi opened in 1968 with the merger of Jackson St. Mary and Jackson St. John, and from 1954-61, St. Mary, coached by Ed Cimock, won eight consecutive Class C/D championships. That streak has not been matched or broken, and during it, St. John was the Class C/D runner-up in 1956.
Those St. Mary teams had real star power. Brothers Dave and Mike Hill led some of those teams and went on to enjoy excellent careers at the professional level. Dave won 13 titles on the PGA Tour and six more on the PGA Senior Tour, while Mike won three times on the PGA Tour and 13 times on the Senior Tour.
In 1972, the Hill brothers pulled off a unique feat, as both won a PGA Tour event in the same year.
Six years later, Lumen Christi won its first MHSAA Finals title – one year after the graduation of Steve Maddalena, who went on to win three Michigan Amateur titles. From 1981-86, Lumen Christi won six consecutive Class B titles – tied for the second-longest streak in MHSAA history to St. Mary’s eight in a row.
Star power, however, has not been a staple of Lumen Christi’s 14 championships. None of Lumen Christi’s championships included an individual MHSAA champion. Jamie Clark was the 2005 Division 3 champion – the only individual Finals champion in school history – and that team did not win the title.
Lumen Christi did have the 1991-92 Mr. Golf in Derek Robison, and although that team won the Class B championship, Robinson was not the individual winner.
In Class B, the Titans had 10 Finals titles and two runner-up finishes. In Division 3, they have four titles with four runner-up finishes.
Lumen Christi is coming off a third-place finish in 2015, which to most schools would be an amazing accomplishment. But for the Titans, it was their worst finish at the Finals since 2008.
“We always go into the season with certain goals, and one is to always win the conference,” Swartout said. “In all the years I’ve coached, my teams have only not won the conference twice. Then, we’d like to keep the Regional streak alive.”
The architect
Swartout has been associated with the program since 1972, mostly as head coach. However, he’s not a natural-born golfer. At one time, he was a frustrated basketball coach.
“I spent one year as a freshman basketball coach at Lumen Christi in 1971 and got an ulcer from it,” he said. “The athletic director said, ‘Maybe you should try something else,’ and so did my doctor. The coaching job opened up in golf, and I couldn’t break 90, so I said, ‘I’ll do that for a while until I get a basketball job somewhere else.’ ”
He never left the program.
“I fell in love with the game and really spent a lot of time reading and watching other good golfers, trying to improve myself,” Swartout said. “I read everything I could get my hands on, because I couldn’t beat any of the kids on the team.”
Between his new-found love for the game and his passion to teach, Swartout became a successful golf coach. He also coached the Lumen Christi girls team when it won the 2004 Division 3 title.
“I was a teacher in the classroom and love teaching, and I think the combination of those two things helped me become a good coach,” he said. “One, from teaching, I could communicate ideas, and two, from all the studying and work I did to improve my game, I learned a lot about technique.
“I do like to think I have a pretty good eye. I can see the small things that a player might be doing. When the juniors get to the level when they are shooting anywhere from 76 to par or better, then when the timing begins to break down. It’s the little things that are making a difference. You’re not going all the way back to create a new swing; you’re trying to find that one little flaw that is impacting their play.”
In those early years, Swartout was working on his game as well as helping his players work on theirs. That, too, proved to be a winning combination.
“I had to really work to improve my game,” said Swartout, whose brother Steve has been his assistant coach the past three years. “I was 24 when I became coach, and by the time I was 30, I was a 2 handicap. In order to get from 90 to that, you have to work at it and learn things. I had to discover how I needed to swing to hit the ball correctly, so therefore from that and reading everything I could get my hands on, I could communicate that to the players.”
The players
While the game hasn’t changed much in the 45 years Swartout has been associated with the Lumen Christi team, the equipment certainly has made great improvements.
“I look back to when I started coaching in the 1970s and 80s and even into the early 90s,” he said. “You’re talking about high school teenagers hitting a golf ball – and not a very good golf ball but a softer golf ball – with wooden clubs that had a sweet spot the size of a dime. Yet I was still getting scores in the high 60s and low 70s, but equipment has made a huge difference.”
Instead of star power, the staple of Swartout’s successful teams at Lumen Christi has been team depth, and this year’s team is no different. Lumen Christi won the Regional at Hantz Golf Club in Tecumseh with four players scoring 82 or lower and a fifth at 85.
Double, the team captain and one of two seniors, led the way with a 75. He didn’t have a three-putt all day. He’s finished second or first in tournaments at least six times this season, and he’s been in the top 10 of every tournament he’s played except one.
“He’s not very big, but we call these kind of players sneaky long,” Swartout said. “You look at them and think they won’t hit the ball far, but he has fairly decent length off the tee.
“Over the course of the past four years, he has worked on every aspect of his game, and he is very dedicated to try and improve.”
The dedication really stood out during the summer after his freshman year.
“I’ve worked so hard to get to the point I’m at now,” Double said. “My freshman to sophomore year, I had no social life. It was golf every day, and I’m not lying. I think I saw my friends once or twice in the summer, but the next summer I hung out with them a little more.
“I’ve been here for four years and finished second twice and third last year. To most schools, that’s a great accomplishment, but to me that’s disappointing. I want to win a state championship.”
The next two players are senior Grant Konkle and junior Luke Girodat. Both shot 82 at the Regional.
“Konkle and Girodat are just flat-out long hitters,” Swartout said. “Both of them can hit it anywhere from 300 to the 340 range. It makes the par 4s rather short.
“Their biggest difficulty this year has been being consistent off the tee. You can hit it a long way, but if you go right or left, that is costing you shots.”
Konkle doesn’t want to leave Lumen Christi without winning an MHSAA championship.
“We’re out here every day working,” he said. “We get something to eat, hit range balls and then go play. We feel the pressure because nobody likes to take second. It’s tough.”
Juniors Logan Anuskiewicz and Riley Hestwood and freshman Tanner Schnell complete the top six players on the team. Schnell competed in the Regional and shot 80 while filling in for Hestwood.
“Hestwood was out of town and couldn’t go down there to practice,” Swartout said. “If you don’t know that course and have never played it before, you are not going to play it well. So I took the freshman, and he shoots 80 and finishes in the top 10.”
It is that sort of depth that gives Swartout confidence going into this weekend.
“I told them this the other day, and other coaches have told me this, too: In terms of having six players all capable of striking the ball, I’ve never had a team as good as this,” he said. “I told them, ‘Look at some of the great teams that I’ve had. I’ve had two teams that averaged 304. I had one team that broke 300 seven times and shot even-par 288 as a team, but never this depth and never as good as this team is.
“Their difficulty is they can’t stay away from the big numbers, and that is what has held us back. They might make a double-bogey here or a triple-bogey there, and if you make a couple of those, I don’t care how well you play the other 16 holes, you’re still going to shoot 80.”
Swartout hopes the players avoid those big numbers, and if they can do that, they will have a great chance.
“We’ve seen every team that is ranked around us, and I don’t think that there is a difference at the top,” Swartout said. “I am biased, but I think my team is better as a team. I’ve got five guys, and I can even throw the freshman in, who all are capable of shooting 75 or better on that course, and I don’t think the other teams have five guys who can do that.
“But we are going to have to play really, really well to win, because if the weather holds, you are going to see some really low scores.”
Chip Mundy served as sports editor at the Brooklyn Exponent and Albion Recorder from 1980-86, and then as a reporter and later copy editor at the Jackson Citizen-Patriot from 1986-2011. He also co-authored Michigan Sports Trivia. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Jackson Lumen Christi’s Will Double tees off during last season’s Lower Peninsula Division 3 Final. (Middle) This season’s Titans: Front row, from left: Grant Konkle, Tanner Schnell, Will Double. Back row, from left: Dave Swartout, Luke Girodat, Logan Anuszkiewicz, Steve Swartout. Not pictured: Riley Hestwood. (Click to see more like top photo from HighSchoolSportsScene.com; team photo by Chip Mundy)