El Dorado sweeps 5A-South Golf Tournament
GLENWOOD — After a storm delay gave players a break of around two hours, both the El Dorado boys and girls teams took home 5A-South Conference titles Tuesday at Glenwood Country Club.
JB Elia shot a low round of 69 to win the boys individual title, while the girls title was decided by two playoff holes after Sheridan’s Emma Hester and El Dorado’s Aubrey Marx both ended the first 18 holes with rounds of 76.
After tying on the first playoff hole, Hester beat out Marx by one stroke on the second after sinking a putt on her fourth stroke. Hester originally thought Marx won the tournament after the first 18 holes, but the senior was not nervous when she realized she would have to be in a playoff.
“To make it,” Hester laughed about what she thought before her last putt. “To not miss it because I missed a few of those during the round. … It means a lot. It’s my senior year, so I wanted to try to win this year.”
On the boys side, Elia said his driver and putter were working the best for him on the day.
“It was my best round of the year, so I thought I played pretty good,” he said. “It’s a big confidence booster. I haven’t played good all year, and this was my first match to finally play good.”
With the Wildcats posting a team score of 307, Lakeside trailed by just two strokes to take second. Lake Hamilton was third with a 366 with White Hall (375), Hot Springs (380) and Sheridan (413) rounding out the team scoring. Only one player from Texarkana competed Tuesday.
Lakeside’s Will Gordon (72) finished runner up for a Rams team that competed strongly on the day, earning a state tournament berth.
Lakeside head coach Kirsten Heideman said the storm delay actually had a positive effect on her team because after a nervous start, the Rams sat in the clubhouse and changed their mindset.
“I think we played pretty well,” Heideman said. “I think the main learning point here is to take every shot seriously. You know, play more carefully, I would say.”
Hot Springs’ Cade Miller (82) qualified for state individually on a Trojan team with multiple two-sport athletes.
“You know, for the first time for a few of our kids that are multiple sport athletes to even come out and play in their first 18-hole golf match with an hour and a half rain delay, I was happy for them,” Hot Springs head coach Josh Smith said. “I’m glad they had a lot of fun. Nobody got upset.”
Lake Hamilton’s boys team also qualified for state with its third place finish, and head coach Brandi Higginbotham was excited about what it meant for the team.
“I’m just so proud of the boys,” Higginbotham said. “This is the first time the boys have made the state tournament in a long time. It wasn’t a perfect day, but they just kept playing. Had to play through a lot of different kinds of weather just like everybody else did.”
The Lady Wildcats turned in a team card of 245 for an easy win as Lakeside took second with a 295. Sheridan came in third with a 326 as Lake Hamilton (339) and White Hall (451) rounded out the team scoring. Hot Springs’ Abigail Finney shot a 110 as the only Lady Trojan to compete Tuesday.
Ginny Higginbotham (96) and Jordyn Garner (98) both qualified for state individually for Lake Hamilton.
“Hosting the state tournament, I’m glad to have some girls involved in it, so I’m very proud of them too,” Higginbotham said.
Lake Hamilton also has many multiple sport athletes playing golf.
“You know this is a lot of pressure that a lot of kids don’t feel if they don’t get out and play the junior circuits like some of the kids do,” Higginbotham said. “Ours’ first sport is another sport besides golf. For our kids to be able to press through and hang in there and handle the pressure, handle the weather delay and still come out and shoot pretty decent scores, I thought they really learned how to persevere through a pretty long day.”
The Class 5A girls state tournament will be hosted by Lake Hamilton and starts Sept. 27 in Glenwood.