Comet boys and girls open golf season with home meets at Cedar Ridge

By John Burbridge

sports@charlescitypress.com

CHARLES CITY — Like finally being felled by an illness afflicting the public far too long, Cedar Ridge Golf Course has been fleeced of much of its lumber due to the carnage unleashed by the ash borer “beetle” which has brought broader meaning to the reference “foreign invasion”.

Not to make light of the situation, but the line of trees that border the right side of CR’s hole No. 9 — a par-4 “dogleg” that has muddled so many golfers coming back to the clubhouse to complete the course’s front nine — have vanished for the sake of Rodney Dangerfield.

Though that gives golfers more room for error with essentially a wider fairway, it’s likely going to get worse before it gets better when it comes to lowering scores.

The debris left by the recent decimation often results in difficult “lies” as well as cover for lost balls. During last Friday’s boys golf triangular hosted by Charles City and including Nashua-Plainfield and Osage, No. 9 proved to be a humbling hole — even for some of the state’s most outstanding athletes.

One of these outstanding athletes was Osage senior Tucker Stangel, a two-time state wrestling champion, who bogeyed the hole.

Nonetheless, Stangel’s nine-hole 39 score was good for medalist honors as it placed him 1 stroke ahead of runner-up Green Devil teammate Heath Voight and Comet junior Carson Gallup, who birdied No. 9 only to come up short in catching Stangel and placing third behind Voight due to a handicap-hole tiebreaker.

With Green Devils Ty Voight (41) and Nate Goddard (43) rounding out Osage’s scoring (163), it placed them 28 shots ahead of the hosting Comets for triangular honors.

Junior Riley Perez (45), senior Gabe Rogstad (53) and sophomore Bryce Walker (53) rounded out Charles City’s scoring (191) in what was the season-opener for all three participating teams.

Nashua-Plainfield’s Dawson Glaser shot a 51 to lead the third-place Huskies (218).

* Charles City’s girls team also held its season-opener at Cedar Ridge on Friday while hosting a dual meet against New Hampton.

Chickasaws Lauren Nuss and Kinsli Dahl paced the back nine scoring with a pair of 44s — Nuss was the tiebreaker-determined medalist.

With Alivia Geerts (48) and Maycen Hackman (52) rounding out NH’s scoring (188), the Chickasaws easily carried the day 43 strokes ahead of the hosts.

Returning all-conference senior Alex Wohlers (56), returning state-qualifier senior Claire Girkin (57), returning all-conference senior Shelby Effle (59) and returning all-conference junior Payton Hadley (59) rounded out the Comets’ score (231).

Both the Comet boys and girls teams are scheduled to take on Waverly-Shell Rock on Tuesday (April 9) — but at different locations.

The boys will travel to Waverly Municipal Golf Course; the girls will host the Go-Hawks at Cedar Ridge.