Horsemen, Hawks tee off in Missoula

Last week, the Horsemen and Blue Hawks competed in their first tournament of the year at the Loyola SacredHeart Invitational.

Loyola Sacred Heart took full advantage of their home course, winning the event with a score of 635. Thompson Falls scored 740 to place fifth and Plains 764, which was good enough for sixth in the field of nine teams.

Loyola proved why they are the reigning two-time state champions beating out second place by 30 strokes. In fact, four of their golfers placed in the top ten overall. Tom Swanson won the boys’ title, scoring 147, Austin Dauenhauer finished fifth, 159, Alex Carlson sixth, 164, and Justin Galiher eighth, 167.

Horsemen coach Teri Kendall was happy to finish ahead of Bigfork, who is a perennial power, but she knows her boys can play better. All in all, Kendall thought her team did alright for their first tournament of the season.

Teams split time at the two-day event playing the first round on Thursday at Larchmont Golf Course before finishing up at the Missoula Country Club on Friday.

On Thursday, conditions were favorable as golfers teed off on the longer of the two courses. According to Kendall, Larchmont has bigger, faster greens and that was quite an adjustment for golfers who had been practicing on temporary greens or ones that had yet to be mowed this season.

Thompson Falls shot a 380 in the first round. Individually Garrett Reinschmidt scored 90, A.J. Pavlik 96, Ross Dalby 95, Travis Hart 99 and Andrew Cox 103 for the Blue Hawks.

Plains finished with a first-round 383. Dallas Burgess shot an 84, Wade Bache 91, Jeff Revier 98, Carson Lilja 110 and Colton VonHeeder 117 for the Horsemen.

Friday, the weather took a turn for the worst as windy, blustery conditions combined with the cold to distract competitors. Missoula Country Club is a tighter course where trees and water seemed to be more of a hazard than those at Larchmont the day before.

Despite the conditions, Thompson Falls shaved 20 strokes off it’s team score to finish with a second round 360. Reinschmidt shot an 86, Pavlik 82, Hart 96, Dalby 96 and Cox a 104.

Plains’ second round was a mirror image of their first as the Horsmen finished just two strokes lower on Friday, 381. Burgess scored a second-round 87, which gave him a 171, the tenth best individual round of the tournament. Bache scored a 99, Revier 92, Lilja 113 and VonHeeder 118.

Kendall is pleased with her team’s effort, citing their willingness to play on weekends or on tournament days.

“These kids are getting kind of addicted to it. Which is good,” she said.

This week the two teams will tee off in Bigfork on Thursday before playing in Plains on Saturday.