Lightfoot leads all golfers, G-E-T third, AHS fourth at opener
G-E-T's Caleb Lightfoot teed off during an invitational golf meet at Fox Hollow Golf Course last Tuesday. The senior won medalist honors with a 2-over par 37. (Times photograph by Benjamin Pierce)
Arcadia's Caleb Pronschinske chipped toward the green in a golf invitational at Fox Hollow Golf Course last Tuesday. Arcadia took fourth as a team. (Times photograph by Benjamin Pierce)
Area high school boys’ golf teams are probably ready for more sun and warmer weather after a season opening invitational last Tuesday that featured temperatures in the 40s and plenty of rain.
Though the steady precipitation teetered between heavy spurts and slow mist throughout the round, both G-E-T and Arcadia did enough to finish in the top four at Fox Hollow Golf Course. The Red Hawks got the best score of any player in the event, too, as senior Caleb Lightfoot won the meet with a two-over par 37.
The Red Hawks golfed to a third place score of 179 to narrowly edge Arcadia (181). Onalaska bested G-E-T by eight strokes to place second, and Holmen won the eight-team invitational with a 159.
Aquinas and Black River Falls tied for fifth at 186, Luther took seventh with a 208, Viroqua/Westby shot a 215 and host West Salem carded an event-high 224.
As winds sliced through the course and cut down high-flying shots, Lightfoot was playing smart golf, coach Rick Schmidt said.
“One of the things that we always talk about is take a nice smooth swing, don’t try killing it. And he clubbed down about two and took a nice easy swing, and he had control and things just fell into place for him. He had a good round,” Schmidt said.
Lance Jumbeck shot a 45 for the Red Hawks, which also got a 47 from Christopher Wagner, a 50 from Braden Bratberg and a 69 from Aiden Dungy.
Schmidt said he tried to help his team by telling them to keep their ball flight lower than usual and to keep their clubs and hands as dry as possible.
“Just go play your game,” he said of his advice. “The conditions are the same for everybody, and just remember you’re not going to use the same club in conditions like this to get it where you need to be.”
Arcadia coach Mitch Sobotta told his players a lot of the same things and was happy to see his team perform the way it did in the opener. With no seniors, he expects his group to grow a lot this season.
“We’re young again, so we’re pretty excited about that and to see what we do as a group,” Sobotta said. “We don’t want to get our hopes up too high, but we’re excited.”
Despite the rain, Sobotta said he tried to keep his golfers in the right mindset. Returning three golfers from last year’s team has helped, he said.
One of those golfers in Cole Sobotta was off to a strong start to his day, but the final few holes were tougher on his scorecard, and he finished with a 43. Joey Tyce had a nice showing for Arcadia from the fourth spot, tying Sobotta for a team-low 43.
Tyce golfed for the first time ever last season and has made a lot of progress, coach Sobotta said.
“It kind of shows how much time Joey has put in to catch up to him (Joey),” coach Sobbota said.
Other individual scores for the event were not reported. Arcadia and G-E-T were both scheduled to play at Coulee Golf Bowl on Tuesday in a conference match.
