Wind the biggest challenge early at CCAA golf finals

By Sean Rooney on October 17, 2018.

srooney@medicinehatnews.com @MHNRooney

Score with the wind at your back and survive the rest seemed to be the prevailing wisdom at Desert Blume Golf Club Tuesday.

In the opening round of the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association’s championships, only three players managed to break par in warm, bustling conditions typical in the coulee.

“It was a big grind, I kept a pretty good attitude, I was positive in my mindset so that kept me on the right track,” said Olivier Ménard of Cegep Andre-Laurendeau, who got up and down from off the back side of the 18th green to salvage a rare par and finish 2-under 70. “It was good.”

Ménard led Champlain St. Lawrence’s Solomon Coupal and Humber College’s Conner Watt by a stroke. Fellow Quebec player Emily Romancew of John Abbott College led the women’s division with a 3-over 75, two shots ahead of St. Lawrence’s Élizabeth Labbé and Medicine Hat’s Becky Martin.

In the team brackets, Ontario’s Humber led Andre-Laurendeau by a shot, while Red Deer College’s women were ahead of the host Rattlers by one entering the second of four rounds.

For everyone, holes like the par-5 18th invoked dread, and often awful scores. Only four of the 59 men in the field managed to birdie the 18th, which played a lot longer than its 510-yard sign suggested, while none of the women got better than par on it.

“Eighteen was playing tough today into the wind, there was a heavy wind coming off the top of the hills,” said Medicine Hat’s Keaton Sulz, who took a nine on the finishing hole and ended the round 57th with an 88. “You almost have to forget about all the hardships you’ve got with that cold weather, just get back to your comfort zone here.”

Ménard eagled the par-5 fifth, then birdied the seventh, eighth and ninth holes but nobody was able to keep that sort of momentum all day. He took a couple bogeys coming home, but was overall pleased with how the day went.

“You’re just playing shot by shot, trying to get more birdies,” he said. “That’s the mindset.”

Ménard — second at junior nationals in Medicine Hat earlier this summer — was eighth at college nationals a year ago in Oshawa, but his team didn’t reach the podium. They’re well on their way to rectifying that blip this week and will be hosting the CCAA’s in 2019. The Boomerangs’ women’s team is third after Day 1, just two strokes back of Red Deer.

“It’s a mindset, we’re here to win,” said Ménard. “We’ve got to beat everybody.”

Also familiar with the top three is Martin, the 2016 bronze medallist. Martin led for about nine holes Tuesday but bogeyed four of her last five, including the ninth (her group began play on the 10th hole).

She chalked it up to some wonky putting.

“I’m happy with where I am and I did leave a ton of shots out there,” said Martin. “My putting, it was more the pace, plus I was a little off-line. I didn’t putt as well as I’d like to.”

But she did feel it was easily fixable.

Romancew played her last nine holes at par, birdieing the par-5 seventh to take the outright lead.

SHOT OF THE DAY — With her entire team looking on from a hill right behind her, Medicine Hat’s Nicole Schultz got up and down from a bunker on the ninth hole to finish her round, parking the bunker shot five feet from the hole despite a brutal downhill slope. Schultz shot a 19-over 91 and is tied for 15th.

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