Thursday, July 24, 2008
If the Hopkins County Central boys’ golf team had a theme song for this season it might be “Lean on Me.”
The 2008 team returns just two golfers who saw significant time on the course last season, and instead will have to act as a cohesive unit to be successful.
“Last year, we had Mitch (Faulk), we had Richard (Moore), a couple other seniors that had been there awhile,” coach Daniel Kukahiko said. “They learned a lot from people when they were younger and they really took the role as leaders, helped out the younger guys, and this year it’s more of a collective effort.”
Along with their coach, this season senior Collin Farmer and junior Heath Williams will be charged as the upper classmen leaders who will bring together a youthful bunch at Central.
“I like it, it feels good,” Williams said. “I like the pressure, I like to see what I can shoot, go out there shoot as low as I can. I like it when they depend on me.”
Williams aims to shoot low and place high in the region in hopes to compete at state, he added.
Joining Williams and Farmer on the team will be senior Blake Nelson, junior Andrew Schniepp, sophomore Joey Watkins and freshman Landon Griffith.
Despite the loss of some key seniors, Nelson thinks this year’s team will be competitive.
“We did lose a lot,” he said. “There’s a lot to be gained though. We got some younger players, and we’re going to work our way up.”
Although the team does not return many regulars from last year’s group, Kukahiko said his golfers have come prepared to practice.
“I’ve seen definite improvement from last year,” he said. “I can tell they’ve been playing. We’re not starting from scratch.”
At the conclusion of the school year Kukahiko asked his players not to let their clubs sit abandoned.
“I ask the guys to play,” he said. “I know a lot of them have taken lessons at the country club from (golf professional) Jeff Howerton, and they usually help them out in a big way. I ask them just to play as much as possible.
“Most of them are members at one of the courses, whether it be Lakeshore, or the city park, or the country club in town. I just ask them to play as much as they can, hit on the range as much as they can, and there’s no substitute for hard work.”
Since official practice began, the Storm golfers have been working hard, preparing multiple times a week at Madisonville Golf and Country Club.
During practice Kukahiko relies on the more experienced golfers to provide tips to the younger group.
Williams has helped Watkins, Griffith, and first-year player Schniepp with hitting straighter drives off the tee, Watkins said.
Griffith believes that with the extra help from the upperclassmen, they may in turn bail each other out on bad days.
“We’re trying to keep the low scores so if somebody messes up on one round, we can help bring them back to the lower score,” he said.
The Storm golf team will finally come together as a whole next week when Farmer, who was unable to practice earlier, hooks up with the golfers.
“I think he’ll be a great aspect to the team,” Griffith said. “Last year he was shooting low 40s. We should have a really good two or three and other people should help bring in low scores, so we should be really competitive this season.”
The team’s youth might be an obstacle at first, but the goals will remain the same, Kukahiko said.
“I don’t think the goals should change,” he said. “I want to be competitive, and I want to let everybody know from last year that we’re still here. We’re still here and we’re still competitive, and we want to give as much competition as we can to the other teams.”
The team’s first test of the summer will come Monday during a junior varsity match at Daviess County. The following day the squad will travel to Owensboro for a scrimmage. On Aug. 4, the Storm begin the varsity season at the Christian County Invitational.
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