Year Of The Tiger! Tigers dream season continues for another Week with State Trip

Off To State!  The Tigers magical season continues as they THS girl's golf team qualified for the 2017 girl's state meet after winning the Jesup district meet last week.  Pictured here are, l-r: Mara Jauron, Kailee Meyer, Addy Duwe, Rylee Conrad and Brittany Huinker.  Back row: head coach Heath Hesse and assistant coach Chad Rezac.

By Ryan Stonebraker

Sports Editor, Tipton Conservative

JESUP — The 2017 Iowa Girls state golf tournament will include the hometown Tipton Tigers among the teams qualifying for the state meet this year.  Tipton shot a team best 404 for the 18-hole Regional Monday afternoon to punch their ticket to the state meet next week.  It will be the first time since 2009 that a Tipton girl’s team has reached a state tournament.  That year, the Tigers girl’s basketball team qualified for the class 2A state tournament.

Tipton girl’s golf coach Heath Hesse thought that the scores would be  close all day, but after the first nine, he had to hold his breath the last nine holes.

“It is definitely exciting to be going to state.  Our total score of 404 is close to our goal of being under 400 for today.  After the front nine where we were at 198, I didn’t think we were playing that well.  I was holding my breath the whole 18 holes,” said Tipton golf coach Heath Hesse.

Tipton senior Mara Jauron watches a tee shot fly during the Tigers state qualifying meet at Jesup last week.  The Tigers qualified for the state meet for the first time in school history.  Photo by Ryan Stonebraker.

Tipton led by five strokes over second place Sumner-Fredericksburg after the first nine holes, 198 to 203.  Jesup was also in the mix at 205 and Wilton was fourth after the first nine with a score of 216.  Jesup hosted the meet and had two golfers score under 50 in the first nine including Isabell Distler with a meet best 42 on the first nine.  Three others, including Tipton’s Meyer shot 47’s on the first nine.

“We have had teams and individuals get this far, but not get through to state.  To be this year, with this team is pretty great,” said Hesse.

“We are such a close team.  We are truely a team.  We haven’t had to rely on one girl to lead us.  We have had several different medalists or kids tie for medalist honros tis year, it’s been incredible,” said Hesse.

Tipton senior Kailee Meyer led Tiger scores with a 96 18-hole score.  She shot a 47 on the first nine and shot a rare higher score on the second nine of 49.

“I feel like the nerves kicked in when we got here.  We knew that we were one of the top team with score averages coming in and we wanted to stay with Sumner-Fredericksburg.  I’m happy that we played ok,” said Meyer.

Meyer will cap her senior year off with one more memory.  After helping the Tiger volleyball team to a state ranking and the basketball team to a good year, she will end her athletic career at the state golf meet.

“It’s cool that my last event at Tipton will be  going to state for golf.  It caps everything for my season year.  I am really excited to get to be with these guys another week.  To go to state with our team is going to be nice,” she said.

Mara Jauron dropped four strokes from her first nine score of 52 to shoot a 48 on the second nine. That 48 score as well as Meyer’s 49 on the second nine were two of the three lowest individual scores on the second nine holes.  

“Looking at the scores today, and when they announced them it was crazy.  I think we all knew we were in good shape, but once they they said fourth, Wilton and third, Jesup, it got really exciting,” said Jauron.

Sumner-Fredericksburg qualified as the second team out of the Jesup Regional after shooting a team low 205 on the second nine holes.  Tipton shot a 206 on the second nine holes.

Other Tipton scores were Rylee Conrad 103, Brittany Huinker 105 and Addy Duwe 119.

Conrad had a smile from ear to ear afterwards and said that she is very excited for her team to get a chance on the state stage.

“It is awesome.  Considering that we all were struggling today, none of us had our best day out there.  But, we are moving on and it feels amazing,” said Conrad.

 

Two seniors led Wilton on the day with Tess Kerkhof scoring a 101 and Alyssa Anderson a 103.  Other Wilton scores were Annabel Grings 109, Eleney Owens 117, Riley Hammann 119 and Taylor Garvin 123.

Wilton golf coach Jamie Meyer said it is hard to end the season and memories made this year, but his team reached their goals this year.

“We had three team goals this year.  First, more wins than losses.  Second, 4th or higher at the RVC meet.  Third, advance out of the first round of regionals.  You can check all three boxes on our team goals,” said Meyer.

“Sadly, we picked a poor times to shoot our worst 18 hole score of the season.  When you move past the first round of regionals, you have to play great golf to have a shot to qualifying for state.  I truly believe the MId-Prairie tournament was a turning point for us as a team.  Our 2nd place finish kind of came out of nowhere, but seemed to instill in the girls we had a chance to be really good this year.  We lost only one dual meet after this point and placed 2nd and 1st in our next two tournaments,” he said.

Durant’s Paige McKee will also be going to state as an individual.  McKee placed 5th overall with a score of 99 to get the last individual qualifier spot.  McKee shot a score of 51 on the first nine, and dropped three strokes on the second nine to shoot a 48.  McKee had a consistent day with hole scores of 5 or 6 on 14 of the 18 holes played.  She shot a 4 on the fourth hole on the first nine and a 3 on the fourth hole on the second nine.

Wilton will lose four seniors from this year’s team including two in the top-7 in Alyssa Anderson and Tess Kerkhof.

“Alyssa and Tess have been mainstays on the varsity during my three years with the program.  They have earned several medalist honors and both earned Elite All-Conference this year,” said Meyer.

“They will be sorely missed next year.  The cupboard is not bare, but we have our work cut out for us to duplicate this past season.  We will need Eleney, Annabel, Riley, Tatum, and Taylor all to make strides this summer in their golf game and turn into the type of people that can be the next group of girls we "always count on" for their score,” he said.

Meyer noted that his golf parents support did not go unnoticed by him or his team.  The loyal followers of the team made several away meets this season and their support was great.

The 2017 girl’s state golf tournament will be held at Jester Park Golf Course near Granger, Iowa in central Iowa.  The meet will be Tuesday, May 30 and Wednesday, May 31 with each team playing 18 holes each day.

Class 2A Jesup District Meet

Monday, May 22

At Jesup

Team Score: 1. Tipton 404, 2. Sumner-Fredericksburg 409, 3. Jesup 422, 4. Wilton 430.

Individual Qualifiers:

1. Courtney Olson (Clayton Ridge) 93, 2. Alyssa Swehla (Sumner-Fredericksburg) 93, 3. Isabelle Distler (Jesup), 4. Kailee Meyer (Tipton) 96, 5. Paige McKee (Durant) 99.

Individual Team Results:

TIPTON (404): Kailee Meyer 47-49 96, Mara Jauron 52-48 100, Rylee Conrad 49-54 103, Brittany Huinker 50-55 105, Addy Duwe 58-61 119.

SUMNER-FREDERICKSBURG (409): Alyssa Swehla 47-46 93, Mariah Nuss 52-51 103, Sydney Rhea 50-56 106, Kiley Kime 55-52 107, Callie Yearous 54-56 110, Jaiden Jacobson 54-58 112.

JESUP (429): Isabelle Distler 42-54 96, Jenna Tolle 49-53 102, Sydney Andrews 54-52 106, Emily Burke 63-55 118, Karson Schaufenbuel 66-74 118, Kelsi Brown 66-74 140.

WILTON (430): Tess Kerkhof 51-50 101, Alyssa Anderson 50-53 103, Annabel Grings 54-55 109, Eleney Owens 61-56 117, Riley Hammann 61-58 119, Taylor Garvin 61-62 123.