Luke Gleason finished sixth individually Saturday, shooting a score of 82 as the Dodge City Red Demons boys golf team opened its season at the Buffalo Dunes Golf Course in Garden City, Kansas Saturday.
Overall, the team finished fifth with a score of 363, just eight shots behind fourthplace finisher Liberal, but 42 shots behind first-place finisher Hays.
Head coach Jim Mapel said he thought the team got off to a good start, with Gleason’s round being a good one even though the weather on the golf course was challenging.
“It was about 25-30 mph cold north wind all day long, so it was a pretty challenging day and I thought Luke played well,”
Mapel said. “Everybody else, the other four kids, that was their first varsity action, so I thought they handled themselves pretty well.”
The team has continued to improve over the last couple of weeks in practice Mapel said.
“We’ve been working hard on our games and on tournament situations and different shots they’re gonna have,” Mapel said. “I thought I saw some progress on that, so I was pleased with our beginning.”
The team is next in action April 16, when they are scheduled to play in an Invitational at Hays High School at 1 p.m. After that, they’ll host an event April 19, at Mariah Hills Golf Course. That one is currently scheduled for 3 p.m.
Mapel said it would normally be nice to compete every week, but in this case,
the break will be almost nice in a way.
“We have some things to work on and we’ll do some different things with players,” Mapel said. “I expect it to be beneficial for us, especially this year since we’re lacking experience.”
The coaches, Mapel said, will put the team through some tournament situations in practice, as well as run the players through small competitions among themselves.
“I think it’ll be good as long as the weather holds up,” Mapel said.
Here were the other scores for the Red Demons Saturday: – Davan Smith shot a 92- Ethan Goertzen shot a 94- Cayden Kerr shot a 95Kale Lowery shot a 109
