DeTour's Wilkie, Cedarville Rise to Top
By
John Vrancic
Special for MHSAA.com
June 2, 2016
ESCANABA — The third try was the charm for DeTour junior Madison Wilkie on Thursday as she earned the Upper Peninsula Division 3 girls golf championship for the first time.
Wilkie, who was runner-up the past two years, fired an 85 at the Escanaba Country Club on this sunny and mild day.
“I think today I was a lot less nervous,” she said. “I’ve been here before and played quite a few rounds on this course. Being familiar with the course helps a lot.”
Wilkie became the first DeTour golfer to be crowned U.P. champion since 2007, when Erin Worden captured the Division 3 title.
Cedarville claimed the team championship for the first time in four years with 402 strokes, followed by DeTour with 434, Munising 460 and two-time reigning champion Bark River-Harris 465.
Wilkie started with a 45 on the front nine, then lowered her score to 40 on the back.
‘I could have done better on the front nine,” she added. “Before we got on the back nine, I told myself I could play a lot better. I started hitting my shots more solid. I was getting better contact with my irons, especially on my approach shots. My tee shots were pretty consistent.”
Cedarville senior Annie Eberts was runner-up at 89. DeTour junior Kaalin Crawford placed third with a 94.
“This is the third time I played here for the Finals,” said Eberts, who shot 97 the past two years. “In the past when a hole didn’t go my way, I would get mad and that’s the worst thing you can do. I stayed calm this time. When a hole didn’t go my way, I just focused on the next hole. I practiced a lot this year. I wanted to end on a good note and help our team. We all worked hard, did our responsibilities and pulled our weight. Madison is a very good player and deserves to be champion. She works hard at her game, too.”
The golfers were greeted by temperatures in the mid 60s and a gentle breeze from the south.
“It was a beautiful day to play,” said Crawford. “You just had to pay attention to the wind. I thought the greens were in perfect shape, and my short game was working pretty good. Taking second as a team will definitely motivate us for next year.”
All four DeTour golfers are juniors.
“The girls played well all year,” said DeTour coach Keli Kelly. “Madison had been close the past couple years and finally sealed the deal today. Us and Cedarville had been the main competition in our area all season. This is a tribute to the girls and all the hard work they do.”
Cedarville has three juniors and an eighth-grader, with Eberts its lone graduate.
“The biggest key is all the girls performed better than in previous meets,” said Cedarville coach Dewey Lopes. “Annie plays real well. She was in a slump earlier, but came through big-time. Our eighth-grader (Lily Freel) also did well under pressure. We’ll graduate Annie. Everybody else will be back, but she’ll be hard to replace.”
Chassell freshman Marli Hietala took fourth at 97, followed by Freel at 98 and Cedarville junior Elissa Griffin at 100.
Junior Bailey Downs was Munising’s leader in seventh (101) and BR-H senior Hannah Starnes was eighth (103).
“I’m very proud of our girls,” said Bark River-Harris coach Scott Farnsworth. “They’ve worked very hard all year. Golf is one of those sports in which every day is different and each year the competition changes. Cedarville and DeTour are very strong teams. There’s pretty good competition all the way around in D-3.”
Painesdale-Jeffers junior Julia Nordstrom in ninth (106) and Big Bay de Noc junior Ariel Cousineau (108) rounded out the top 10 individual placers.
PHOTOS: (Top) DeTour's Madison Wilkie tees off on No. 10 at Escanaba Country Club during Thursday's Final. Wilkie, a junior, was the tournament's medalist with an 85. (Middle) Cedarville's Lily Freel watches her putt catch the lip of the hole on No. 6. Freel, an eighth grader, took fifth overall with a 98. (Photos by Amanda Chaperon.)
Performance: TC West's Anika Dy
October 25, 2017
Anika Dy
Traverse City West junior – Golf
The now two-time reigning Lower Peninsula Division 1 champion claimed her second straight MHSAA individual title and led West to its second team championship in three seasons Friday and Saturday to earn the Michigan Army National Guard “Performance of the Week.”
Dy shot a two-day 141 to best the field at The Meadows at Grand Valley State University by eight strokes, leading off with a first-round 69. Her 141 tied the fourth-lowest 36-hole score in MHSAA Girls Golf Finals history, and she became only the 11th golfer to break 70 for an 18-hole Finals round. West’s team score of 626 was 22 strokes lower than the field and ranked third all-time in Lower Peninsula/Class A Finals history. Next season Dy will play to become only the fourth in MHSAA history to win three Lower Peninsula girls golf individual titles – and she also finished runner-up as a freshman by only a stroke.
Her numbers this entire season were similarly incredible. Dy averaged 69.6 strokes for 18 holes and shot no worse than par in any of her rounds with only two double bogies the entire fall. Outside the high school season, she made the Michigan Women’s Amateur Championship semifinals this summer and played in the United States Golf Association Women’s State Team Championship in New Mexico alongside her sister Anci, a freshman on West’s team this fall who tied for sixth at last weekend’s MHSAA Final. Anika Dy already has committed to continue her golf career at University of Michigan, and she carries a 4.0 grade-point average.
Coach Karl Gagnon said: “She works harder than any golfer I have been around. She will practice at 7 a.m. before school just to make sure she gets her practice time in. And as good a golfer as she is, she is a better person. She is humble and never fails to tell the kids she plays with she enjoyed playing with them. She encourages everyone she plays with. At the same time, she has that competitive fire in her. The first day of state finals, she came off the course so upset with her round. She felt anger she didn’t play better. I asked her what she shot. She gave me her card … 69. I said, ‘Are you kidding?’ But that’s Anika. Always wanting to do better.”
Performance Point: “It’s still kind of a shock. Honestly it was a goal to go there and win, but I still can’t wrap my head around it – especially since it’s our second win as a team in the last three years,” Dy said. “I was on a roll (during the first round). I didn’t really know what I was doing. I just kept going with it. The second day was a different story. I struggled a little more. But that first day was really, really, really fun. (Putting) definitely lowered my score a little bit because my long game wasn’t there to back it up. … (The championships) were all special in their own ways, but this year was maybe a little more special because my sister was on the team, so it was fun to share that experience with her. And doing it a second time around just really lets me know what I’m doing is working. It’s really helped my confidence going through this year and for next season too.”
Ready to represent: “One of our seniors really, really stepped up, Megan Jenkinson. I’m so proud of how she played; those were probably her best two rounds this whole season (Jenkinson tied for ninth). We prepared really well, and we just came together as a team. We were in such a good mindset, and it just worked out in the end. We always like to joke about representing the northern Michigan side of things because we’re so far away, and not many other teams know that we’re up here sometimes. So when we come down, we like to show them what we’ve got and make a run for it.”
Sister act: “Just growing up together (with Anci) playing golf and everything is really fun, and we never got to actually play on a team before in a competitive setting. So just to be able to do that and experience it for the first time was fun and exciting and new. Neither of (our parents) play golf. I got into it because of my dad, but he only stuck with it for a year and quit, but I kept going with it. It’s funny because people are always like, ‘Neither of your parents golf?’ and I’m like, ‘No, it’s just us two.’ To be honest, I was more interested in the golf carts before I was interested in golf, but eventually my dad got me clubs and I just kept with it because I loved it so much, just competing.”
See a different game: “I just love watching golf, whoever is playing, just because those are the best people, on the TV. And obviously there’s a reason why they’re the best. So you can always learn something from their long game, short game, mental game, whatever it is; those are the best players and you can definitely learn something from any of them. I think I watch to see their strategy and what they do so I can kinda imitate them and see what works for me, because obviously it works for them – so maybe it will help get my game to the next level as well.”
Golf and grades: “My parents are always school first and then golf, so in order for me to do what I love I have to do well in school as well. They’re pretty strict with my grades and school and all of that. They understand though that I’m really busy with golf and school, so they kinda cut me some slack sometimes. I think (golf and academics) go hand in hand. They both teach you discipline and time management, which is important for college because you do also miss a lot of school when you go to tournaments, so I think it’s preparing me well for that college experience.”
- Geoff Kimmerly, Second Half editor
Every week during the 2017-18 school year, Second Half and the Michigan Army National Guard will recognize a “Performance of the Week" from among the MHSAA's 750 member high schools.
The Michigan Army National Guard provides trained and ready forces in support of the National Military Strategy, and responds as needed to state, local, and regional emergencies to ensure peace, order, and public safety. The Guard adds value to our communities through continuous interaction. National Guard soldiers are part of the local community. Guardsmen typically train one weekend per month and two weeks in the summer. This training maintains readiness when needed, be it either to defend our nation's freedom or protect lives and property of Michigan citizens during a local natural disaster.
Previous 2017-18 honorees:
October 19: Andrew Zhang, Bloomfield Hills tennis - Read
October 12: Nolan Fugate, Grand Rapids Catholic Central football - Read
October 5: Marissa Ackerman, Munising tennis - Read
September 28: Minh Le, Portage Central soccer - Read
September 21: Olivia Theis, Lansing Catholic cross country - Read
September 14: Maddy Chinn, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep volleyball - Read
PHOTOS: (Top) Traverse City West's Anika Dy watches one of her drives during last weekend's LP Division 1 Final at The Meadows. (Middle) Dy tests the strength of the wind before an approach shot. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)