Clover football gets boost from inaugural Tee Off Tourney scramble

CLOVERDALE – When success has been fleeting, it’s not always easy to tell what kind of support a program has.

It wasn’t hard for Cloverdale’s football program and head coach Tyler Lotz to know that the Clover community is still standing by their side at the Tee Off Tourney golf scramble over the weekend.

The event saw 21 groups of four participate at Clover Meadows GC with funds from the event going toward the Cloverdale football program.

Lotz said while a common idea, it was one Cloverdale hadn’t done for the football team in the past.

“It was myself and assistant coach who had the idea to do a scramble,” Lotz said about the planning behind the event. “We wanted to do something last year but we didn’t want to pull people away from the scramble that boys’ basketball hosted.

“We talked about it with the basketball coaches and they moved theirs to the fall so we could have one this summer.”

With all 18 holes having sponsors and more teams than holes, Lotz said the participation was tremendous to the point that the event was eventually capped out in terms of those that could play.

“We had a great turnout for a first year scramble,” Lotz pointed out. “Even the owner of the course didn’t expect us to get that many sponsors and teams. “We had 18 teams initially, then added three more and we had interest for more but there weren’t enough carts available to make that happen.”

Lotz added the interest made it easier to organize than the staff had anticipated, helping make the event a success for the program.

“It was awesome to see the amount of family and friends, college buddies, local business and community support we had out there,” Lotz said. “We really didn’t have to do too much: once we announced the scramble, people kept asking to join.

“We reached out to some local businesses and were able to put them down quickly as well, so it was a good fundraiser in general for us.”

More importantly for Lotz, the amount of community involvement reinforced that there was an appetite to see Cloverdale football move onward and upward.

“It’s awesome to see the amount of people who want Cloverdale football to succeed,” Lotz said. “I don’t think people outside of the community see it all the time but since the first day I was here, the support has been great from the teachers and administrators, from people out in the town and even from other sporting events.

“The support is pretty special considering the times we’re in. If we can get some wins and get rolling, we can continue to build that support in the stands on Friday night even more.”