Last week from March 14-16 both the Trinity men’s and women’s golf teams headed to Jekyll Island, Georgia, to compete in the Jekyll Island Men’s and Women’s Invitational. The Jekyll Island Invitational marked the fifth tournament for both teams.
The women finished 7th out of 20 teams after finishing with a final three-round score of 973. This saw them finish ahead of some of the best DIII colleges in the nation. First-year Hanna Niner finished sixth individually out of over 120 golfers with an end score of 232.
“I got sixth individually. third, fourth, and fifth places beat me by one stroke, so it was really close but it was a lot of fun,” Niner said.
The team as a whole was also happy with their performance.
“This is the best we’ve ever done at that tournament. Even though Southwestern beat us by three strokes we played really well still,” said sophomore Brigette Lee.
Unfortunately, to qualify for nationals, winning the conference championship is not enough. To receive an automatic National Championship bid, there needs to be at least six teams in a conference, and currently SCAC only has five. However, the Tigers are confident that if they continue to play well and tweak a few small things at the next two tournaments, they have a good chance at going.
“We’ve never been to nationals before, but I think this year we have a really good shot at it. We really need a few more strokes, mainly in short game, to get better, and that’s what we are really going to work on in the next few weeks. Everyone is hitting the ball well. We just need to work on putting and short game,” said women’s head coach Carla Spenkoch.
The men’s golf team also participated in the Jekyll Island Invitational and finished 12th out of 30 teams overall. Their three-round score was 898, which was 28 strokes behind the winner, Illinois Wesleyan, who shot a total score of 870. The highest-finishing Trinity golfer was senior Tyler Lehmann, who shot a 219 total and tied for 12th out of around 150 golfers. First year Trevor Warner finished 20th overall and shot a 221. Junior Kalen Vos got 48th place with a final score of 226. Senior Austin Jung came in 127th and senior Erik Long-Goheen got 148th. Overall, the team had mixed feelings about their results.
“The tournament went okay this weekend. Not good or bad. We played solid golf as a team for two days, but were unable to play well the third day. I would have hoped that we would be a little higher in the standings, but overall I feel that we are positioning ourselves well for a run at nationals. Our goal is to win both of the tournaments. I feel that we are good enough to accomplish that if we work hard the rest of the season,” said Warner.
