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Golfers earn medals

Coming into this season, both the men and women’s golf team had big expectations.
“Our number one weapon is experience. We have our whole team except one guy back this year,” men’s coach Jim Waite said. “Having a year or two of experience in the [Ontario University Athletics] is huge, and we have great leadership from Charles Fitzsimmons and Johnny Hall, so I think we’re going to be really solid this year.”
The women, on the other hand, lost many of their top golfers. However, despite rebuilding this year, they brought back stars Caitlin Jennings, Lisa Boyko and Katie Lebel with a handful of talented recruits.
Although early in the season, both teams seem to be living up to expectations, performing well enough to medal in both golf tournaments this past weekend.
The women’s team earned silver at both the St. Thomas Invitational and the Western Invitational held at Sunningdale Golf Course on Thursday and Friday respectively.
Jennings led the team at Sunningdale with a 78 followed by Amy Williams and Lebel with 84, for an overall top score of 246, just behind Queen’s who took the title at 234.
The four-time defending OUA champion women’s team will have its work cut out with Queen’s winning three consecutive tournaments this season.
The Western men on the other hand settled for third place once again. After Thursday’s tournament in St. Thomas, Waite was hoping to rebound from a bronze medal.
“We were disappointed. Our captain Charles [Fitzsimmons] shot a 79, which was unlike him, and two others shot 78. We know that course so those numbers shouldn’t have been that high,” he said.
Michael Hastings came in on Friday hoping to help the Mustangs advance up the medal standings, but unfortunately it was not be.
Waterloo performed well in earning silver at Sunningdale and will be one of Western’s biggest competitors this season.
“We expect good results. We still don’t have all our top players here but we expect good things,” Warriors coach Dave Hollinger said.
Jimmy Latta of Waterloo scored the lowest of any player with a 68, helping Waterloo capture the silver medal with an overall score of 298 — two strokes ahead of Western.
Even with back-to-back bronze medals, Hollinger still doesn’t underestimate Western’s potential.
“Western is always a top team. Laurentian and Guelph also seem to have a good team, and Toronto is the defending champion so I’m sure they will have a very solid team again,” he said.
Like the Mustangs, Hollinger sets his team’s goals high for the season.
“Our goal is to win the OUA. We’ve won it three of the last five years, and we’re hoping to return to the top,” he said.
In an impressive display over the weekend, Laurentian shocked the competition by winning both tournaments in London.
“Laurentian surprised us yesterday. They’ve never medaled in anything before this year, but they have some really solid young guys,” Waite said.
With back-to-back gold medals this week, it could be possible that there will be a new OUA champion this year.
With the season still early, the men should be able to rebound before the OUA finals at the Angus Glen course in Toronto in mid-October. However, Waite has issues with the championships being played in such frosty weather.
“The one thing that’s wrong is that we qualify all our teams in this great weather, and by the time middle of October comes around we have cold, rain and sometimes snow so we don’t know who the players are that perform well in cold weather,” he said.
Both teams now head to Waterloo with the men playing at the Whistle Bear Golf Club and the women playing at the Cambridge Golf Club next weekend.

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