All Pitch in to FHN's 1st Title since 1982
October 21, 2017
By Wes Morgan
Special for Second Half
BATTLE CREEK – Bedford Valley Golf Course doesn’t leave a lot of room for mistakes.
Fortunately for the girls golf team from Grand Rapids Forest Hills Northern, it hasn’t made all that many this season.
The Huskies secured their first MHSAA championship since 1982 with a two-day total of 656, turning in a round of 329 on Saturday after entering the second round of the Lower Peninsula Division 2 Final with a seven-stroke lead. Bloomfield Hills Marian shot up from fifth to runner-up with 668 strokes.
Led by freshman Lilia Henkel’s 79-77-156 (eighth individually), FHN was able to finish strong with big contributions from the entire lineup. Junior Kay Zubkus carded 160 (78-82) for a tie for 10th place individually. Maddie Goodrich, a senior captain, fired an 81 on Saturday for a total of 168, and senior captain Chloe Johnson recorded rounds of 83 and 89 for a 172. Anna Fay shot 93 on Friday and Gabby Mas finished with a 95 on Saturday.
“We had a seven-shot lead going into today and felt very good,” Forest Hills Northern coach Kent Graves said. “That was a good cushion to have. It allowed us to play maybe a little more conservative than we would have if we were behind. Our girls responded. We shot two shots higher than we did yesterday, but it was enough to win and we feel really good about it.
“You don’t win state tournaments at the (Nos.) 1 and 2 spots; you win them at the 3, 4 and even 5 spots. You have to have solid scores there. Our 3, 4 and 5 were exceptionally good this year.”
A key for the Huskies, who finished sixth in Division 2 in 2016, was managing Bedford Valley’s slew of elevated greens, which were even more difficult at times as the leaves fell relentlessly.
Goodrich and Johnson, who played their final prep rounds, did just that. Goodrich pointed to the 391-yard par-5 fifth hole, where she birdied, as the catalyst to her round. She also birdied the par-4 15th hole as part of a strong finish.
“It was like no time passed while I was playing,” Goodrich said of the surreal feeling of going out as a Finals champion. “It just flew by. (Friday) I had a few rough holes and some first-day nerves. Coming into today, I knew I could shoot the score I wanted to if I just went one shot at a time.”
Added Johnson: “It feels amazing. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy. I’ve always dreamed of being a state champion, and I never thought I was going to be able to do it. But here we are.”
Individually, it was Marian freshman Shannon Kennedy who devoured the 5,422-yard layout with a 2-under par 70 in the final round for a medalist total of 146. In her championship debut, Kennedy penciled in five birdies — three in her final eight holes — to finish ahead of Midland Dow senior Alexis Carras (74-75-149). Kennedy posted a round of 76 on Friday.
With 10 years of hockey experience, Kennedy’s trademark early on in her career is her length off the tee. Saturday she was able to convert distance to scoring with her effort on the greens.
“Pressure doesn’t seem to bother her,” Marian co-coach Cathie Fritz said of Kennedy. “The hardest thing was it was a slow round, so there was a lot of standing around before they’d tee off. We had her walk to a tree or walk somewhere else so she wasn’t just standing there staring at it. She just has a great attitude, and she’s truly one of the most coachable kids I’ve ever been around. She made the clutch putts that she needed to make, whether they were for birdie or for par.”
Marian shot 16 strokes better Saturday. Senior Alexandra Robb posted an 81 for a three-stroke improvement from Round 1, freshman Lauren Sass’ 85 was seven shots better than Friday’s round, sophomore Marlo Hudson was steady with 90-90 and junior Kate Zink trimmed nine shots from her first-round score to finish with a 90 on Saturday.
“For being as young as Shannon and Lauren are, it’s really fun to see them so calm under pressure,” Fritz said.
Kennedy birdied two of her first seven holes with three pars in the mix. Two of those birdies were on par-5s, and she also managed to birdie the tricky par-3 12th hole.
“It was a crazy day,” she said. “It was long, it was hot and it was tiring. I knew I had to pull it together and fire a good number on the back nine, and I did.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Forest Hills Northern’s Chloe Johnson rolls a putt during Saturday’s second round. (Middle) Marian’s Shannon Kennedy watches one of her drives on the way to claiming the medalist honor. (Photos by Wes Morgan.)
Senior Season Setting Up as Brody's Best of Storied Grand Blanc Career
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
August 31, 2022
Grand Blanc’s Kate Brody entered her senior golf season a bit conflicted.
The 2020 Lower Peninsula Division 1 Final champion knew her game was as good or better than it’s ever been, but she wasn’t happy with some recent results.
Then she shot a 62.
“I just was hitting every shot kind of right where I wanted to,” said Brody, who shot 10-under par at The Fortress in Frankenmuth on Aug. 25 during the Saginaw Valley League Preseason Tournament. “I wasn’t really thinking about much while I was playing. I’ve never played that well before. There was probably only one shot that I wasn’t happy with.”
The 62 was a personal best in tournament play for Brody, and could be the spark for the final year of an already illustrious high school career.
Brody has never finished outside the top four at an MHSAA Finals event, taking third as a freshman and fourth as a junior. She was named first-team all-state by the Michigan Interscholastic Golf Coaches Association after all of her first three high school seasons, and has committed to play golf at the University of Wisconsin when this school year is done.
But Brody wasn’t happy with how her summer season had panned out, and even on the day she shot 62, said she didn’t feel all that confident until she got to the first tee box.
“I didn’t have as good of a summer as I wanted to playing in tournaments around the state,” Brody said. “I wasn’t nervous going into my senior season, but I knew I was going to have to keep working hard to shoot the scores I wanted to. I feel like my game is definitely better than the last couple summers. I think I’ve gotten smarter on the golf course. I’ve definitely gotten better near the green with my chipping and putting, and I’m hitting it a lot farther, too.”
That leaves the main ingredient for Brody’s success in her own head – and she’s mastering that approach as well.
“My mental game has gotten a lot stronger,” she said. “I know that I’m going to have bad shots and a couple bad holes. I’ve tried really hard to keep it together and honestly forget about it and move on.”
All of that work has made this level of success possible for Brody, but she started with quite a foundation.
Brody’s parents, Jenn and Doug Brody, are the LPGA professional and head professional, respectively, at Warwick Hills Golf and Country Club. Jenn played at Michigan State and on the LPGA Tour, and was inducted this past summer into the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame.
Kate started playing at 4 years old, although she said there are pictures of her holding a club earlier than that. She didn’t start playing competitively, however, until she was 11.
“I don’t think my parents really wanted to push me into it,” she said. “I just really liked coming out to the golf course in the summer. It was just fun for me. I didn’t really take it super seriously until middle school. I also played travel soccer and basketball when I was little. Those were my main sports over golf until like seventh grade.”
Golf became Brody’s main focus right around the time Glen Bauer took over as coach of the Grand Blanc girls program. And he knew before she took a class at the high school that he had something special.
“I started coaching when Kate was in eighth grade, and I tried to get her on the varsity team when she was in eighth grade,” Bauer joked. “Some young players, you know right away if they have what it takes to be a great golfer and a great person. She just was so far advanced from pretty much everybody that’s been here as a freshman. A lot of that is DNA, but it’s also what she had worked on since she was 4½.”
While Brody grew up rooting for the Spartans, and had a coach who was pulling for her to wind up at Michigan, it was Wisconsin that got the jump on recruiting her and never fell back to the rest of the pack.
Badgers coach Todd Oehrlein was in contact with Brody the first day he was allowed by rule, and a visit to Madison in October of 2021 sealed the deal.
“I could tell that he and (assistant coach Kristen Simpson) really wanted me,” Brody said. “I wanted to go somewhere I felt wanted and felt like I would be valuable to the team. I really felt a good connection with my coaches at the start, and that was a big part in the decision. As soon as I stepped on campus, I really fell in love with it. It blew me away, everything about it. I didn’t have a lot of interest in visiting other places.”
Brody’s commitment came shortly after her junior season wrapped up, and she admitted the recruiting process had created excess pressure in the past.
Now, it’s one less thing to worry about as she tries to focus on the matches and tournaments immediately ahead while working toward the bigger goal of another Finals title.
“Those big goals are always in the back of my head,” she said. “I think it’s really necessary to have them to achieve what you want. But when I’m going to the next tournament, it’s not like I’m thinking about the state championship. I’m thinking about that round. When I’m off the course, I’m thinking of that bigger goal.”
Paul Costanzo served as a sportswriter at The Port Huron Times Herald from 2006-15, including three years as lead sportswriter, and prior to that as sports editor at the Hillsdale Daily News from 2005-06. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Genesee, Lapeer, St. Clair, Sanilac, Huron, Tuscola, Saginaw, Bay, Arenac, Midland and Gladwin counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Grand Blanc’s Kate Brody, here following through on a putt, has posted a tournament personal best 62 this season. (Middle and below) Brody, as a toddler and a few years older, took to the game at a young age and made it her main game during junior high. (Photos courtesy of the Brody family.)