Golf coaches Jim Hoffman, of Seymour, and Greg Personett, of Trinity Lutheran ,were hoping for lower scores than what their posted in matches on the front nine at Shadowood Golf Course Monday.
New Albany shot 166 to defeat Seymour and Columbus East, which both scored 178s. Seymour placed second based on the fifth players’ scores.
Trinity defeated Salem 178-196 in a dual match.
Both matches were on the front nine.
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Jacob Keith of Trinity Lutheran had the low score for the day with a 3-over-par 39.
Leading Seymour was Tyler Bullard’s 43. Connor Hinton and Owen Marshall both recording 44s, and Hunter Browning shot 47 for the Owls.
“We really weren’t doing much of anything very well,” Hoffman said. “Playing on Saturday in bad conditions (at Bedford) — that’s what we’ve played in all year — I felt like coming out on a nice day we would have a little bit better day.
“I think, really, the putting got us today. That was the biggest key. The greens were rolling pretty fast, and we weren’t used to them. The greens had been really slow the past couple months. Obviously, they weren’t today and we had trouble on the greens.”
The Owls are off until Saturday when they play in the Bloomington North Invite.
“We’ll just have to go back and get ready for Saturday and work on some things and hope the good weather sticks around like I think it is,” Hoffman said. “We’re moving in the right direction. It was a good experience getting to play in some good weather. We’re hitting the ball well, we just didn’t score well. Sometimes you have that in golf
“Golf is an up-and-down game. We played two seniors and three freshmen. The course is in great shape. The fairways are starting to come out of their dormancy. In a couple weeks it will be in really good shape.”
Besides Keith, the only other Cougar to break 50 was Mark Shoemaker, who shot a 44.
Personett said he was pleased his team defeated Salem after the Lions won the Cougar Invitational on Saturday.
“Our score is not too bad,” he said. “I think a couple of these scores could have been a lot better. I think we should be shooting 170, 172. We were about 10 shots off tonight.
“The course played beautiful tonight. The greens were quick, the wind was down, the sun was out, and the fairways are starting to come in. There’s no blaming the golf course for this one.”
Like Hoffmann, Personett wants to see an improvement in the short game.
“I think we need to work on our short game, and we need to work on our mental focus,” Personett said. “I don’t know if we’re prepared to hit every shot like we should. So that is something we definitely need to work on right here at the mid-season.
“With the greens being the speed they are, three-putts and four-putts were rampant for some reason, so they’ve got to learn how to adjust to the speed. On the short game, you’ve got to be very careful where you land the ball and how it runs out. We’ve got to work on that and it will make a difference when tournament time comes around.”
The Cougars will host Hauser today.