Munising Girls Earn First Golf Title
By
John Vrancic
Special for MHSAA.com
May 30, 2013
ESCANABA — The Munising girls made a bit of golf history for themselves Thursday, earning their first MHSAA Upper Peninsula Division 3 title with 416 strokes.
They were followed by Bark River-Harris with 435, Crystal Falls Forest Park with 444, defending champion Cedarville at 447 and DeTour at 474.
'“I think our consistency is what got us here,” Munising coach Bette Immel said. “We have four seniors who’ve played four years of varsity golf. This is a great way for them to end their careers.”
The Mustangs were led by sophomore Carla Nottmeier, an exchange student from Germany who was runner-up with a 93 at Highland Golf Club.
“On the front nine, I felt I wasn’t doing well with my driving,” Nottmeier said. “I didn’t get the distance I wanted, but that got better on the back nine. I started to relax a little more and hitting the ball a little farther. It’s a great feeling for us to win as a team.”
Sophomore Margo Brown, St. Ignace’s lone representative, was crowned individual champion at 90.
“I double-bogeyed the first three holes,” said Brown, who fired a 43 on the back nine. "After that, I told myself to shake it off, and I relaxed a little. I hit with my irons pretty good and putted pretty well.”
Brown, who played mainly on the school’s boys team during the season, had a chance to do two practice rounds at Highland, which she said proved helpful.
“I came up here with my dad on Saturday, then I had an 85 in a practice round here yesterday (Wednesday),” she added. “I knew what I had to do on every hole. The greens were real hard today. You had to hit the ball short and let it roll. You also had to club down on the par-3s.”
BR-H junior Savanna Stenberg hit 94, including 45 on the back nine.
“I started real bad on the front nine,” Stenberg said. “I was having a problem with chipping. My short game improved on the back nine, which was a big boost. I wanted to shoot a 42 on the back nine and hoped to finish in the high 80s. I know I could have done better, but I’m still pleased with my score. I had the home course advantage, which was pretty helpful because I knew where every obstacle was on the course.”
This marked the second straight runner-up finish for the Broncos, who placed second in Division 2 a year ago.
“Savannah shot a great round,” BR-H coach Scott Farnsworth said. “I’m proud of all the girls. They’ve worked extremely hard and done well all year. The girls all come from families who play golf. They have a golf background and understand the terminology. I hope they play golf all summer and keep improving their game.
“A lot of it is course management and knowing what to do. There was a lot of rough out there today. If you didn’t stay on the fairway, it added strokes in a hurry.”
Stenberg was followed by DeTour eighth-grader Madison Wilkie with a 95 and Forest Park junior Lexi Gussert and Munising senior Molly Mattson, both at 99.
Gussert, who came in as defending champion, already has offers to play basketball
at several major colleges including reigning NCAA Division I national champion Connecticut, which she’ll be visiting in the near future.
Also part of Munising’s championship team were seniors Katie Immel, who hit 107, and Eve Gendron at 117 and Emily DesJardins at 120.
“Our four seniors are awesome kids,” coach Immel said. “Their cumulative GPA is about 3.8, and they’re great ambassadors to our community. They’re close friends and they’re all like my daughters.
“We were pleased to have Emily on the team this year. She tore her Achilles tendon in the first basketball game last year and didn’t think she’d be able to play golf. But the doctors cleared her shortly before the season. I think this really means a lot to her.”
Full results will be linked when available.
PHOTOS: (Top) German exchange student Carla Nottmeier shot a second-place 93 to lead Munising to the Division 2 team championship. (Middle) St. Ignace's Margo Brown watches a putt fall on the way to her medalist score of 90. (Photos by Keith Shelton.)
GR Catholic Central Earns 1st Finals Title, Timpf Claims 3rd Medalist Honor
By
Dean Holzwarth
Special for MHSAA.com
October 21, 2023
ALLENDALE – Adverse weather conditions couldn’t prevent the Grand Rapids Catholic Central girls golf team from making school history.
Despite two days of rain, wind and chilly temperatures, the Cougars overcame the elements to win their first Lower Peninsula Division 3 Final.
Catholic Central shot a 673 at The Meadows at Grand Valley State to win by 12 strokes.
Williamston finished runner-up with a 685, while 2022 champion Macomb Lutheran North (696) was third.
“It’s exciting,” Catholic Central coach Kim Napieralski said. “Just think about it. The boys had their first a couple years ago, and now the girls have their first. We’re on a roll.
“The good news about this weather is I have mudders for players. They don’t care about the conditions as much as some other teams perhaps. It was hard to get through the puddles of water, but they just kept playing.”
Lutheran North senior Lauren Timpf won the medalist honor, claiming her third individual Finals title. She became the seventh golfer in MHSAA Lower Peninsula girls golf history to achieve the feat, carding a 5-under-par 67 to finish with a two-round 141.
The Cougars’ previous best team finish at the Finals was fifth, which happened last year, but they got contributions from across the line-up to prevail.
“It’s been that way all season,” said Napieralski, who returned three of her top four golfers from a year ago. “A couple of girls at the top and then our three, four, five and sometimes even six. It could switch up any day. We go really deep as far as talent across the board.”
Junior Ava Wisinski led the Cougars with a 158 and finished sixth individually.
“I'm just so proud of my teammates," Wisinski said. “We knew it was going to be a challenge when we went into it, but we really stuck it out and it was a good fight.
“It was really wet out there, but I think we did well despite the conditions.”
Sophomore Kelly Preston also placed in the top 10 with a 159, while sophomores Margaret Deimel and Sofia Piccione and senior Katie Cook also played well.
Cook, the team’s lone senior, said it was even sweeter to win in her final tournament.
“I’ve been on the team since my freshman year, and just seeing it grow has been awesome,” Cook said. “We worked so hard to get here. We’ve had a really good season, and our depth is where we shine and we can all put together good scores on any day.
“We came into today thinking we were even with everyone around us. The conditions were awful, and half of it was playing golf, but half the battle was dealing with the conditions out there. It was really hard, but we did it. We were willing to battle through it.”
Catholic Central opened with a 334 and led Lutheran North and Williamston by 18 strokes heading into the final round.
“It was important to play well the first day and it felt good, but we came into today with the mentality that we’re going first day again,” Napieralski said. “We are all even, straight up.”
Timpf fired a first-day 74 and was tied with Spring Lake’s Zoe Dull entering the final 18 holes. Dull and Grand Rapids Christian’s Lillian O’Grady both finished with two-day totals of 149 to tie for second.
“I know I didn’t play my best golf yesterday, and I just really tried to block it out of my head and know that I am capable of going low,” Timpf said. “Since it was my senior year and last high school tournament, it just really meant the world to me to come out here. I've been working all four years to try and accomplish this goal, and to just come back from where I started today and end up winning is super special.”
Timpf recorded a double-bogey on her first hole, but recovered with four straight birdies on the back nine.
“After the first hole I thought that I’m not going to win this if I don't start making some putts,” Timpf said. “I started draining a bunch of birdie putts, especially on the back nine, and that got it going for me.
Williamston was tied with Lutheran North entering Saturday, and the two teams were still knotted on the back nine.
“What my girls did the last hour and a half is kind of a blur to me,” Hornets coach Brian Kent said. “We started making putts, we started making chips and I thought for the first time in school history we are in the top five and might get state runner-up.”
The Hornets shot a 333, the lowest in the final round. This was their first top-two Finals finish.
“I'm proud of my team,” Kent said. “I knew on day one of practice that we had a special team, but this is not what I thought. This course is tough on a good day, let alone with these conditions. We all had to play the same conditions, but they were hitting greens and fairways all day long and that's what saved us.”
Leading the way for Williamston was junior Nicole Schafer, who finished fourth overall with rounds of 77 and 73.
Freshman Paige Radebach and seniors Ellie Thorburn and Allison Kane rounded out the top four.
PHOTOS (Top) Grand Rapids Catholic Central's Ava Wisinski follows a shot during the weekend's LP Divison 3 Final. (Middle) Macomb Lutheran North's Lauren Timpf putts during her run to a third medalist honor. (Click for more from High School Sports Scene.)