Northern golfers ready to wrap up season downstate
Easton Aho
Boden Moore
Easton Aho
Boden Moore
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MARQUETTE -- Golf would seem to be ultimate summer sport, though trekking along a course through cooler conditions and the color of autumn leaves might be just as good.
So that's why the men's and women's golf teams are wrapping up their fall seasons over the next several days.
Both Wildcats teams are headed to the Panther Invitational in Augusta, between Kalamazoo and Battle Creek, on Saturday and Sunday.
This meet serves as the league tournament preview as just about all teams will be there from the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, along with the actual spring GLIAC meet to be at the same venue.
While the women wrap up their season with that event, the men immediately head over to suburban Detroit for the Warrior Invitational at the Island Golf Club at West Shore in Grosse Ile, located on an island of the same name in the Detroit River.
The Wayne State-hosted event is Monday and Tuesday that ends the men's fall season. The women already played in the same-named Warrior Invite in the latter part of September at another course in the Detroit area.
This weekend's Panther Invite takes place at Stonehedge North for the women and Stoatin Brae for the men.
Fans can follow along with live scoring at the college golf website called Scoreboard at scoreboard.clippd.com, along with subscribing to the official NMU golf social media channels, or visiting the Northern athletics website at nmuwildcats.com and looking under the men's golf or women's golf schedules for links to a preview.
Wildcats head coach Ben Johnson had a short and succinct summary of his teams' success this fall provided to NMU Sports Information for the news release previewing the upcoming tournaments.
"So far, so mediocre," he said.
The men's team has finished near the bottom of the leaderboard in both of its tournaments -- 10th among 10 teams at the Bulldog Fall Classic hosted by Ferris State and tied for 14th of 15 squads at the Flyer Fall Intercollegiate conducted by Lewis University in Illinois.
The NMU women have fared a bit better, eighth of 10 squads at Ferris, ninth of 14 at its Warrior Invite, and sixth of 11 at the Flyer Fall event.
Northern, though, has some young talent on the men's team and solid team scoring for the women, possible ingredients for success down the road.
"The guys' team struggled a little bit in their first two tournaments, but I think they're trending in the right direction," Johnson said. "We have two young guys leading the way from Marquette (Senior High School graduates), Easton Aho and Boden Moore; they showed some bright spots in our last tournament.
"They're going to carry that over into our GLIAC preview ... at Stoatin Brae downstate, and then hopefully our other guys that are on the team can kind of pick up their game and set the tone going into the spring season.
"The women's team played pretty solid in our last tournament. They were in fourth for a little bit, kind of struggled the last day, but are definitely taking some large steps in the right direction.
"We were not the most skilled team in our division last year, but we've gotten a lot better. We have more consistent scoring, everyone's kind of doing their part, and we're looking pretty solid, and I'm excited for them."
It's been noted that it's a big step from high school to college golf, with a major part being able to succeed on more challenging courses.
"I think most of our team is pretty level-headed, so they don't let it really affect them, but it's hard not to, you know?" Johnson said. "It's only human to be out there and have the elements and some sort of adversity getting under your skin. Whether you're not making putts and you're hitting the ball well, or you're not hitting the ball well and you're making putts, golf's an interesting game.
"It's the mental thing, and that's something that we're constantly trying to work on. We're very fortunate, too, our assistant coach Tom Gemignani is a sports psychologist, so he's been able to help get them to focus in on certain things or see golf in a different way that even I haven't thought of. So it's pretty helpful."
Story contents based on a Northern Michigan University Sports Information press release previewing the meets. Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee's email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.