Sluggish sectional

BRADFORD, Ohio — The Indians finished off the regular season on a high note.

They went undefeated in the Midwest Athletic Conference, won the last 12 dual matches of the season and earned the conference tournament title for the first time in program history.

Despite the accomplished regular season, the Indians had a poor outing at the wrong time, ending their season in the sectional.

The Fort Recovery High School girls golf team struggled through the OHSAA Division II Southwest Sectional that lasted over six hours from the Indians’ first tee time at Stillwater Valley Golf Club on Tuesday.

The Indians ended in ninth place with 445 strokes, the worst of their three 18-hole matches by 22.

“It was disappointing,” said FRHS coach Jeff Vaughn. “I thought we had a good chance. I thought we’d play better today, since we were here on Saturday (for the MAC tournament), but that’s the game of golf.”

When FRHS played at Stillwater Valley Golf Club in the MAC tournament on Saturday, it shot a 418. That score would have earned the Indians a regional berth. (The top four teams advance to the regional.)

Instead, the four teams to move on were sectional champion Graham Local (398), Fort Loramie (418), who Fort Recovery beat in a nine-hole match on Sept. 19, Russia (422) and Versialles (437), who the Indians topped by 24 in the MAC tournament.

Olivia Knapke came the closest to moving on as an individual — the top four individuals not on qualifying teams move on to play in the regional — with the team-low score of 102. She fell short by seven strokes, as Indian Lake’s Alex Kinney claimed the final berth in a shoot off. Others to make it through were sectional champion Reaghan McDaniel (78) of Riverside, Reagan Brewer (82) of Tri-Village and Isabel Flores (91) of Lehman Catholic.

Knapke ended up tied for 12th in the tournament with Graham Local’s Riley Donnelly. She shot four of the Indians’ six pars on the day, including on the 152-yard, par-3 17th hole. The junior’s drive went well, bouncing onto the green and rolling to within five feet of the hole. On her first putt attempt, she correctly played a line that went from right to left, but didn’t put enough on her shot to be short by 6 inches. A tap in secured the even score.

Her other pars came on the first, ninth and 13th holes. She also had three bogeys and was the only Indian to never shoot double-par or worse.

“She had a rocky start,” Vaughn said. “She triple-bogeyed the first two holes and that kind of sets the tone right from the get go. She just never really got it back.”

The only other pars came from Emma Will on the 10th hole and Georgia Wenning on the seventh.

Will provided the second-best score of 110 for the Indians, while Evvie Briner and Mallory Evers rounded things out with a 116 and 117, respectively. Wenning’s 122 didn’t play into the final.

Briner had a particularly strong finish with four bogeys over the last six holes, including the seventh and eighth. Strong play on No. 7 earned her the bogey, while an iron shot got saved by some tall grass before it could go into the rocks on No. 8.

While Fort Recovery couldn’t continue its hot season, it returns four of the six staples to its lineup next year and four of the five sectional competitors. 

“I don’t think we need to dwell on this,” Vaughn said. “Obviously it was a bad day and those things happen. Hopefully they work in the offseason and see the potential that we have. … I feel bad for Emma with it being her last year playing as a senior, but all good things come to an end.”