North Putnam finds 'purpose', wins county girls' golf title

Tuesday, September 11, 2018
North Putnam won the girls' golf Putnam County championship on Monday evening. Members of the team are (from left, front) Brittany Bonifacius and Abby Simmerman; (back) Haley Greene, Ashley Lawless, Alley Angermeier, Grace Timm, Nyiah Goff and coach Linda Patrick.
Contributed photo

Cougars win first girls' golf title since 2004

CLOVERDALE — North Putnam’s girls’ golf team has shown improvement at times this season, while posting some enormous numbers on the scoreboard on other days.

On Monday evening, the Cougars put everything together in the Putnam County tournament and captured only the school’s second county title in the sport.

“This is truly an exciting win,” said North Putnam coach Linda Patrick, whose school has competed in the sport for 19 years and won its other title in 2004. “The girls played with a real purpose in mind, and that was to make a good showing — both team-wise and individually.”

Sammie Shrum hits a tee shot during Monday evening's county tournament. She was the medalist with a 44.
Banner Graphic/JOEY BENNETT

Sammie Shrum of Cloverdale was the medalist with a 44 in the tourney played on the front nine at Clover Meadows on an abnormally cool night with very little puddling left over from weekend rains. Shrum won by five strokes over a trio of golfers who tied for second place — Bailey Shuee of Greencastle, Abby Simmerman of North Putnam and Drew Steffy of South Putnam.

Others earning all-county honors for placing in the top eight were Greencastle’s Molly Ramey (51), Cloverdale’s Grace Leonard (52) and North Putnam’s Nyiah Goff and Haylee Greene.

Shrum and Shuee had been expected to be among the frontrunners for medalist honors, but the true surprise of the evening was the performance of the Cougars.

Patrick has maintained all season that her team was capable of producing good scores, and is happy that they chose one of the season’s biggest stages to prove her correct.

“We have worked the last several weeks on all the troublesome shots that have kept us from improving each meet,” she said. “Our last several practices were dedicated to only one or two elements of the game. Perhaps the biggest element was how to get prepared mentally for each meet. I sent the girls a text about how to play the meet and how to play smart.”

Patrick said that specific things her players needed to improve upon were learning to play the conditions of the course and take every advantage they would be granted.

North Putnam's Abby Simmerman gets ready to hit an approach shot toward the green in Monday evening's county golf tournament.
Banner Graphic/JOEY BENNETT

“When I saw my players [Monday] night, they were relaxed and didn’t show any emotion that indicated negativity in their game,” she said. “That to me is a sign of maturing as a golfer. Every single player contributed greatly to the team success.

“The scores all reflect hard work and determination to reach goals, and — in some cases — don’t reflect how well they truly played,” Patrick added. “I am very proud of them.”

North Putnam finished with a team score of 214, while Cloverdale was second at 223, South Putnam third at 225 and Greencastle fourth at 229.

Cloverdale coach Kyle Walter was pleased with how his team played.

“Sammie Shrum has been playing better and better through out the year and [Monday] night against a very talented group she stayed consistent down the stretch to bring home the win,” he said. “Hats off to North Putnam for the win. They have had the most consistent top-to-bottom team the entire year.

South Putnam coach Cassie Lehmann thought her team’s inability to play for several days due to the heavy rainfall hurt its performance, considering its previous success against the other county teams.

“Most of our girls were not ready to play after all the rain we had,” she said. “These girls are so used to being out on the course every day that three days off of golf really hurt us.”

Lehmann noted that her team had beaten all of the county schools twice already this season – once during regular season play and again at the conference match.

“I think our success in the season made us relax a little too much and let our scores slip a bit,” she said. “We still have beaten Greencastle all three times that we have played against them – which is something that we wanted to accomplish. With the young team that we have, we will come back next year ready to play for the title.”

Greencastle coach Steve Paquin noted his team played one of its best rounds of the season, but putting problems prevented the Tiger Cubs from placing higher.

“The girls shot one of their best nine-hole scores of the season,” he said. “They hit many good drives and second shots, but struggled on the greens to make their scores too high to secure the championship.”

The order of finish was considerably different than at the Western Indiana Conference tournament played on Aug. 25. In that event, South Putnam had the best score of the four county teams by placing sixth among the 12 WIC squads, followed by North Putnam in seventh, Cloverdale in eighth and Greencastle in ninth.

All four teams will compete in sectional action on Saturday, with North Putnam playing at Crawfordsville and the other three schools playing at Forest Park in Brazil.

Cloverdale hosted West Vigo and North Putnam played at Western Boone on Tuesday as those teams closed out their regular-season schedule.

Greencastle hosts Danville today at Tiger Pointe Country Club for Senior Night, with Shuee and Serena Patch being honored.

South Putnam also closes out its regular season today by hosting Tri-West at Clover Meadows.

Members of the 2018 all-Putnam County girls' golf team were (from left, front) South Putnam's Drew Steffy, Cloverdale's Sammie Shrum (medalist) and Greencastle's Bailey Shuee; (back) Cloverdale's Grace Leonard, North Putnam's Abby Simmerman, Haylee Greene and Nyiah Goff and Greencastle's Molly Ramey.
Contributed photo

2018 Putnam County girls' golf tournament

(“AC” indicates players earning all-county honors)

Team scores — North Putnam 214, Cloverdale 223, South Putnam 225, Greencastle 229.

North Putnam scores — Abby Simmerman 49 (AC), Haylee Greene 54 (AC), Nyiah Goff (AC), Brittany Bonifacius 57, Grace Timm 61.

Cloverdale scores — Sammie Shrum 44 (medalist), Grace Leonard 52 (AC), Gayle Baugh 63, Libby Dominguez 64, Michaela Nees 65.

South Putnam scores — Drew Steffy 49 (AC), Kate McCammack 56, Leighla Hazlett 57, Alex Steffy 62, Kortnee Starks 66.

Greencastle scores — Bailey Shuee 49 (AC), Molly Ramey 51 (AC), Kadence Shaner 62, Serena Patch 67, Jennifer Scott 73.