Waukon girls golf team brings back quartet of varsity veterans for 2017 campaign

The Waukon girls golf team is fielding one of its smallest teams in recent seasons, as 13 young ladies have reported for early-season rounds on the course. All but one of this season’s participants comes from the upperclassman ranks of either the junior or senior class, including a senior trio and one junior who make up the four returning letterwinners leading this spring’s squad.

Seniors Annika Anderson, Kayla Palmer and Caitlin Shelton, along with junior Kylee Hager, make up that list of varsity veteran returnees. “With the experience of all these players, I am looking to them for their leadership,” Waukon girls golf coach Kathy McMillan said. “Half the team are seniors and will all have the experience of competition, and they will have good competition within themselves. Actually, all team members but one will have the experience of competition.”

That veteran foursome returns from a squad that placed fifth at the Northeast Iowa Conference Tournament and fourth in the Tribe’s Class 3A Regional Tournament last spring, one place shy of further postseason tournament advancement. Missing from that mix will be graduated senior Leslie Sivesind, who was the Indians’ most consistent top-end performer and their only All-Conference performer from last season. “Leslie was an all-around solid player and captain of the team,” Coach McMillan explained.

Helping to fill that graduation vacancy will be a junior pair that Coach McMillan sees some early-season promise from. “Junior Carley Sweeney played a lot of summer golf and I am seeing great improvement in her,” Coach McMillan said. “Junior Matti Pladsen, first-year out, is showing good potential.”

Coach McMillan is strongly encouraged by what she has seen since this season first got underway. “I could see all great golf swings and making contact with the ball the first day of practice,” she said.

That early-season display, coupled with the extensive list of returning experience within this spring’s dozen upperclassmen, has Coach McMillan looking forward to the start of competition this season with great anticipation and some lofty standards for her charges to pursue. “Our goals are set high as a team and individuals,” she remarked. “We want to bring home the conference trophy and our ultimate goal is to make it to State.”

Helping the golf Tribe strive toward those goals will be what Coach McMillan sees as keys for her squad to focus on. “Good team chemistry,” she explained. “We are working for solid team strength by building confidence in all aspects of the game, especially making them better chippers and putters.”

Those keys will be needed to compete in a strong Northeast Iowa Conference again this season, with Coach McMillan seeing her squad as competing well within that mix. “New Hampton will be the number-one threat, they have five returning letterwinners,” she said. “We will be right there in the top.”

The Indians were scheduled to get their 2017 quest underway with back-to-back nights of competition to start this week, hosting South Winneshiek Monday, April 3 before playing at Charles City Tuesday, April 4. That Monday, April 3 date has now been postponed to April 21 due to rainy weather. The lady linksters are then slated to host Waverly-Shell Rock and MFL/MarMac in another back-to-back pair Monday and Tuesday, April 10 and 11.

“With all the experience this team has, we should have a very successful season,” Coach McMillan summarized in speculation.