Raiders ready to challenge for league golf title again
FAIRBORN — If Wright State golf coach Conner Lash were asked how the season was going through the first four fall events, he would’ve tried to pick out the positives — that’s just who he is — and wouldn’t let on how much the task of replacing three of five starters was weighing on him.
The Raiders lost two-time Horizon League golfer of the year Tyler Goecke to Illinois, and individual tourney winners Davis Root and Cole Corder exhausted their eligibility.
But after starting with finishes of fifth, fifth, ninth and sixth, Lash and his crew ended the fall with its best showing in perhaps a couple of years.
They nearly pulled off a win in the loaded Dayton
Flyer Invitational, finishing one stroke behind Illinois, which has won 14 straight Big Ten titles, and two shots behind champion Marquette, which has won four of the last eight Big East tourneys.
Fifth-year player and former Horizon League champ Mikkel Mathiesen and senior Andrew Flynn tied for fourth, and sophomore Shane Ochs, the 2022-23 HL freshman of the year, tied for 11th.
The Raiders picked apart the brutal NCR South Course, shooting 10-under-par over three rounds.
“We were right around the lead going into the last round, and we didn’t fold. They threw some punches, and we threw some punches back. We hung right with them,” said Lash, who is in his third year.
“That was a really a big moment for me. Most of the fall, I was trying to feel out where we were, and then that happens. I was like, wow, we can be just as good as we were the last two years if we stay hungry.”
The Raiders are the league preseason favorite for the fifth straight year and have the consensus top player in Mathiesen, who set the HL tourney record with a 13-under 203 score in 2022.
A native of Denmark who lives in Qatar — he’s there now playing sun-soaked casual rounds — has the thirdand fourth-best single-season averages in program history of 71.0 and 71.42 (right behind Goecke’s 70.36 and 70.47). He averaged 69.93 in the fall.
“Mikkel has a completely different role than he’s had any year he’s been here. He’s GOT to be the guy,” Lash said
“The last couple years, we had guys that you can say were 1-A, 1-B, 1-C, 1-D. We had a lot of good talent. But I think everybody on the team kind of looks to him to be the anchor, and there’s a little bit of pressure.
“But I told him, ‘Hey, if you want to go play professionally, you’ve got to come out and play your best golf all the time.’ And I think that’s getting him ready for this year.”
The Raiders, who have two firsts and two seconds in the last four HL tourneys, are counting heavily on Flynn and Ochs.
They shared the No. 5 spot last season, but they’re ready for bigger roles.
Wright State opens the spring season Feb. 19-20 at the Border Olympics in Laredo, Texas. The league tourney is April 20-22 at Howeyin-the-Hills, Fla.
“Flynn has come a long way. He’s talking about how he’s disappointed he hasn’t won a tournament individually. He wants the team to do well, but once I heard that, I was like, ‘All right, you’ve turned a page,’” Lash said.
“He says, ‘I’ve been knocking on the door. I’m ready to win.’ You want four or five guys teeing it up every week who are trying to win.”
Flynn, a senior from Louisville, went 71-70-67 for a 5-under 208 at the UD tourney
“It did a lot for me, finishing on a high note — and even more for the team,” Flynn said.
“We came up a couple shots short, but we were right there with some of the best competition. To be one of the guys at the top of the pack was just kind of a cherry on top.”
He averaged 71.87 in the fall, while Ochs (pronounced Oaks), a Carroll High School grad, averaged 71.4.
“It’s a different feel compared to the teams we’ve had. Last year, I was a junior, and I was the youngest players in the traveling five. This year, we’re a lot younger,” Flynn said.
“But there’s a lot more upside, a lot more potential. I think we could surprise a lot of people.”
So does Lash. He said tryouts for the five spots for the opening tourney was fierce.
“The difference from the eighth man to the one man was four or five strokes,” he said.
“Anybody on the team can be in the lineup. I have faith in all of them.”