Clean sweep for Blossom golfers

Leading the conference standings handily, the Blooming Prairie girls golf team was expected to win the conference but with three boys teams in contention to win the conference title it all came down to the conference final tournament on Thursday, May 20.
Fortunately, the Blooming Prairie boys team did just enough to win by two strokes, which give the Blossoms a clean sweep in the Gopher Conference.
The Blooming Prairie boys team was led by Garret Farr who shot a 41 at the conference final tournament last Thursday. With each team’s best four scores making up their team score, the Awesome Blossoms’ team score was rounded out by Colin Jordison, David Kartes and Kaiden Alwes who all shot a 44.
Coach Carl Peterson said the strengths of the Blossoms’ team are its six pretty consistent players and the golfers’ work ethic.
“Practice ends at 5:30 but many days almost all of them keep practicing until almost sundown. Golf requires a lot of repetition and they’re putting in a lot after practice every day and on the weekends,” Peterson said. “You can’t keep them off the golf course,” he joked.
That hard work could be the result of some extra motivation after coming in second place in the section two years ago when just the first-place team made it to the state tournament.
Given their recent success, Peterson expected the Blossoms to compete for the conference title this season.
“We knew we’d have a chance because we did well two years and we returned the same team from two years ago,” he said.
However, it wasn’t that easy.
“After the first nine holes on Thursday, it looked like we’d lost the conference, but then we had two kids who have not been our top performing golfers, Garret Farr who shot a 41 and Kaiden Alwes who shot a 44, which were their best scores of the year. Kaiden is sometimes our fifth scorer but his second nine really helped us,” he said.
Thanks to Farr’s and Alwes’ back nine, the Blossoms won the conference title by two strokes.
On top of winning the conference, three Blossoms also earned individual honors: Colin Jordison and Kollyn Alwes were named All-Conference and Garrett Farr was named Honorable Mention All-Conference
Meanwhile, he reported that the girls team was quite a ways ahead at the beginning of the conference final tournament so there was little doubt they’d win the conference.
The girls’ commanding success throughout the season is even more impressive when you consider that the Blossoms had just one girl out for golf last year.
“We knew Halle [Strunk] and Jessica [Ressler] would be good, but we didn’t have any idea about the other four golfers,” he said.
Strunk, who averaged a 46.8, and Ressler, who averaged a 47.2 did indeed lead the Blossoms, but Maggie Bruns also finished in the top five individual golfers in the Gopher Conference with an average of 55.5.
In addition to team success, three Blossoms earned individual honors when Halle Strunk, Jessica Ressler and Maggie Bruns were all named All-Conference.
Regarding who would be the conference’s top girl golfer, Peterson said Strunk and Ressler were very close all season. In the end, it was Strunk who beat out Ressler for individual first place by two strokes.
“Both Halle and Jessica work very hard in the season and in the offseason. They spend a lot of time with Aaron Ressler and his golf simulator. They just worked hard enough year-round to make themselves better players,” he said.
He mentioned that Bruns, who was competing in golf for the first time this season, struggled at the beginning of the season, but, “It’s unbelievable how much she’s improved over the course of a month and a half.”
While winning the Gopher Conference title is a great accomplishment for both teams, Peterson said the Blossoms will have to continue to improve to achieve similar success at the section tournament.
“The one thing that we’ve worked on the most is the short game, chipping and especially putting. We have improved but we could stand further improvement if we want a shot at the state tournament,” he said.
Having come so close to reaching the state tournament two years ago, Peterson said it’s certainly a goal of the boys to reach the state tournament this year.
The girls team hasn’t had the same sort of recent success at the section meet, but he still believes they can achieve similar success.
“We didn’t how good the other teams in the section are, but there is a chance the girls could win at sections,” he said.
The boys next compete at Owatonna Country Club against Owatonna on Thursday. Both teams will be playing the Section 1A tournament at Eastwood Golf Club in Rochester on Tuesday and Wednesday.