FORE: Harbor Springs Ace Back for More
October 9, 2020
By Tom Spencer
Special for Second Half
Fore!
Golf etiquette dictates that golfers should always yell "fore" upon hitting a shot that carries the risk of hitting another golfer. As long as one yells "fore," the golfer did all she or he could to warn the other golfers.
Golfers also are supposed to convey this message to others in as polite a manner as possible.
“Four” though is the polite warning golfers should heed as they participate in the Division 4 golf championship at Michigan State University’s Forest Akers West on Oct. 17.
The school record-holder from Harbor Springs is not likely to exclaim “four” – but she is looking to at least claim “four” — as in consecutive MHSAA Finals championships.
Jacque O’Neill won the individual title last fall as a junior. She’ll be looking to repeat that feat as well as help the Rams win a third team championship in four seasons after they finished Division 4 runners-up in 2019. O’Neill, now a senior, was a freshman on the 2017 Division 4 champion Harbor team and a sophomore on the 2018 championship squad.
Shouting the word “fore” once usually suffices, although it's acceptable to shout it repeatedly if the shot is sailing toward another group of golfers.
No one would blame O’Neill is she shouted four repeatedly.
But be clear. O’Neill isn’t sounding this warning. Her golfing is.
In addition to seeking a fourth straight team or individual Finals championship, she is likely to be selected to the Division 4 all-state team for a fourth-straight year. She is coming off a third-straight Regional individual championship.
Her hopes for a team title this October lie in four as well. Harbor has a pretty good idea whom of its golfers will fill the top three scoring spots. The fourth will go to one of the newer players. The fourth may make the difference as the Regional champions seek another Finals championship.
“My goal is certainly to win another state championship, but I wouldn’t say that I feel a lot of pressure,” O’Neill said. “I’m just looking at it as another chance to show my ability, and hopefully break my new record.
“Any nerves I feel after that usually changes to excitement, and it is one of my favorite feelings.”
O’Neill put her name in history books this fall. She shot a school-record 73 at the Cheboygan Country Club.
“She works for everything,” said her coach Pete Kelbel. “She practices all the time.
“If she plays a round and her putting his bad, guess where she is practicing ... on the putting green.”
Kelbel is taking the Rams to their eighth-straight Finals. He’s won two titles with his record-setting senior’s older sister, Calli O’Neill. Calli, now on the golf team at Aquinas College, and Jacque have benefited from strong family support and three golf professionals, one of whom is especially closely tied.
Brian O’Neal, the girls’ father, is a golf pro. He was once named to Golf Digest’s “Best Teachers” list in Michigan. Jacque has received guidance from another golf pro, Shaun Bezilla, Harbor Point’s head golf professional and director of instruction. And, her high school coach, Kelbel, is a golf pro at Walloon Lake Country Club.
“I want to express my extreme gratitude for being a part of such an amazing program with such great teammates,” the younger O’Neill said. “Being on the golf team these past four years has been one of the greatest experiences of my life, and I am very excited about my next chapter. But it is very hard to say goodbye to this one.
“I have met so many amazing people, and I have such great memories,” she continued. “So thank you to everyone who has made this journey so great. I also want to thank Shaun Bezilla for helping me get my game to where it is today along with Pete Kelbel for all of his help in making me the player that I am today. As well as everyone at Boyne Highlands for their support. I would not be where I am today without the help from these people and many more.”
As she prepares for another Final, she is focused on all the family support she receives.
“Calli was one of my teammates in the past, and she has always pushed me to work harder and practice more,” Jacque noted. “She has definitely helped me fall in love with the game of golf because it is something that we love to do together.
“My dad has helped me develop my game throughout the years and pushed me to work harder,” she went on. “My mom, Connie, is my biggest supporter and comes to all my matches. She is always encouraging me. Having a family that all loves golf certainly helps! My extended family has also always encouraged me and helped me along the way, which means the world to me.”
Harbor Springs athletic director Anna Rigby is proud of the golf program’s history. She is looking for another good result at this month’s Finals.
“I've developed an incredible sense of pride watching the program be so successful year after year,” she said. “For Jacque to consistently achieve that level of success in a sport like golf speaks volumes to her fortitude and commitment to the game.
“I'm feeling good about what we'll see from her in the Finals again this year.”
Kelbel has his own “fore” warning for everyone. Although it is really more of a fact of the matter.
“Jacque can’t get enough golf,” he said. “She has kept growing and getting stronger throughout the year and improved her strength as swimmer.
“She’d play if you tied her up like a mummy,” he continued. “She just deals with it and she wants to shoot a school record every time she plays.”
Tom Spencer is a longtime MHSAA-registered basketball and soccer official, and former softball and baseball official, and he also has coached in the northern Lower Peninsula area. He previously has written for the Saginaw News, Bay County Sports Page and Midland Daily News. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTO: Harbor Springs’ Jacque O’Neill fires an approach during the 2019 Lower Peninsula Division 4 Final at Battle Creek’s Bedford Valley. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)
Northville, West's Dy Cap Remarkable Runs
October 20, 2018
By Matt Schoch
Special for Second Half
BATTLE CREEK – Mother Nature kept extending the illustrious high school golf career of Traverse City West’s Anika Dy on Saturday.
But all good things must come to an end.
More than eight hours after teeing up at Bedford Valley Golf Course, Dy sank the final putt of her even-par 72 round to earn her third straight MHSAA Lower Peninsula Girls Golf Finals Division 1 title by six strokes.
It came on a blustery and rainy fall Michigan day that tested the resolve of golfers across the state and caused more than two hours of delays in Battle Creek.
“You can’t complain about it or whine about it. You just take it for what it is and be positive,” Dy said. “It was hard, not going to lie. It was a mental grind more than anything.
“Yeah, it was rainy, cold, windy, snowy, whatever, but It’s up (in your head) where it’s the hardest.”
Dy finished at 4-under 140 for the two-day event, which was weather delayed twice Saturday.
Northville dominated the team competition, closing an undefeated season by topping Kensington Lakes Activities Association rival Plymouth by 31 strokes.
Northville shot 312 on Saturday, combining with a 318 from Friday for 630.
In the week leading up to the tournament, Northville coach Chris Cronin asked the Mustangs to share a reason for why they were playing in the Finals.
“Every girl that’s playing on the state team sent back the note that they’re playing for their teammates,” Cronin said. “That was huge. I knew at that point we couldn’t lose because that’s what you shoot for as a high school coach.
“They’ve been close like that all year. That’s what made it really just extraordinarily special.”
Northville was led by sophomore Nicole Whatley, who took fourth as an individual after shooting even-par 72 despite the conditions, tying Dy for the day while playing alongside her in the final group.
“We’re definitely really close,” Whatley said about her team after carding four birdies on Saturday. “We’ve been so close together, non-stop, every single day. We just fell in love with the game and each other.”
The title was the Mustangs' first. But Northville will be the team to beat next year, as Mariella Simoncini is the lone graduating senior.
Simoncini, who said she will sign next month with Oakland University, took 13th with 163. Junior Sufna Gill tied for fifth at 155, sophomore Katelyn Tokarz tied for 20th at 168, and junior Sedona Shipka tied for 25th at 170.
Led by Dy, TC West, the reigning champion and winner of two of the previous three championships, took third at 664, three shots behind Plymouth.
Meanwhile, Dy joins four other Michigan high school golfers to win three individual Finals championships since the MHSAA began sponsoring the sport in 1973. The others are Maple City Glen Lake’s Nichole Cox (2014-16), Okemos’ Elle Nichols (2011-13) and Ann Arbor Pioneer’s Kate Loy (1993-95) – and Pontiac Notre Dame Prep’s Danielle Staskowski won her third Division 3 championship Saturday.
The final round for the University of Michigan commit, who plans to sign with the Wolverines next month, was not without its tough moments.
On hole seven, Dy aggressively went for the par-5 green on her second shot, ending in a greenside bunker.
Dy then went up and down from there, nailing a 15-foot putt for her second of two birdies on the day and seventh for the tournament.
“I hit that clutch putt,” Dy said. “It was not a day for birdies, so I really treasured that one.
“I think that was one of those moments to keep the momentum going.”
Then, after the second weather delay, Dy had trouble finding her ball among the leaves on the 16th hole, although she eventually tracked it down – on the fairway, of course.
She managed to par, then did the same on 17 and 18 to close her career and a season where she won every event but one, a tournament in Alpena where she was nudged by her younger sister, Anci Dy.
“The one on 18 I’m going to remember for a while, because I knew it was my last hole as a high schooler,” Anika Dy said. “It was like 8 feet, it wasn’t an easy putt, and I made it and it just felt really good.”
Dy, the two-time reigning Miss Golf recipient by the Michigan Interscholastic Golf Coaches Association, could become the first player to win the honor three times.
After missing out on a Finals title as a freshman by one shot, Dy won by two shots in 2016, eight shots last season and topped second-place Mikaela Schulz, a senior from Bloomfield Hills, by six shots Saturday.
Utica Eisenhower sophomore Ariel Chang, who shot 1-under 71 on Friday, took third at 148. Whatley was fourth at 149, and her teammate Gill, a junior, tied Anci Dy – Anika’s sophomore sister from TC West – for fifth at 155.
“It’s been so much fun,” Anci Dy said of playing with her sister. “I’m going to miss her.
“I don’t think she has a bad bone against anybody here, ever. She’s just so supportive. She’s very humble, which is something a lot of us just admire her for.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Northville’s Nicole Whatley watches an approach during Saturday’s second round of the Division 1 Final at Bedford Valley. (Middle) Anika Dy follows through on a shot on the way to claiming her third individual Finals title. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)