By Brennan Stebbins (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
The Ozark girls golf team showed off some impressive depth on Monday.
All five golfers earned All-Conference honors and the Tigers won their second-straight Central Ozark Conference championship, this year at the Carthage Golf Course.
“Early on one of our goals was to win conference again,” Ozark coach Daniel Mullis said. “They wanted to come in and win it again. I didn’t graduate anybody last year so our next step is to win a district championship and then go from there and get back to the state tournament as a team.”
The Tigers placed eighth in the Class 2 tournament last year.
Monday’s outing was a good tune-up before Ozark takes part in the District 5 tournament next Monday.
The Tigers were led by sophomore Maddie Greerlee, the number four golfer on the scorecard. She finished with a 79, which was third best individually.
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“That’s her lowest score this year and last year,” Mullis said. “She’s gotten a lot stronger this year and it’s helped her. She hits it out front, goes and gets it. She’s really good with her wedges and that showed today with the wind we had.”
Georgia Fraser shot 83 to earn fifth place, Elizabeth Freeman and Maddie Jenkins each shot 87 to tie for seventh and Olivia Hanks carded a 92, good for 10th overall.
Ozark scored 336 as a team.
“That’s kind of how we’ve been all year, we’ve been real consistent,” Mullis said. “That’s all we can ask for. We’ve got some depth that other teams don’t have which is good. I’d like to see our scores obviously get a little better once we roll into districts but we’re playing well right now. It’s a good time to do that.”
Carl Junction senior Jenna Teeter won the individual championship for the third-straight year after shooting 71 on Monday. A three-time state qualifier, she tied for 12th in Class 2 last year and was sixth as a sophomore.
“I’m really happy I’ve got the chance to win the past three years,” she said. “Just got to keep it going. Hopefully I can play really well at state and districts and sectionals.”
After getting through some early downhill holes, she cruised through the last dozen or so.
“I hit some good drives, I had really good approach shots,” she said. “I could chip it really close, go up and get that tap in par or birdie. The wind was pretty crazy sometimes but I was able to manage that and be able to hit some good shots.”
In the team standings Carthage was the only other school to pose a challenge to Ozark. The Tigers had three medalists: Hailey Bryant, who shot 78 to finish second; Sara Golden, who finished fourth at 82 and Rylee Scott, who took ninth at 88.
Carthage still finished 16 strokes behind Ozark, though. And Carthage was at least 36 strokes better than everyone else.
Webb City was the only other school with a medalist. Sarah Oathout shot 86 to place sixth.
Branson’s top golfer was Lexie Misemer, who carded a 93. Joplin was led by Katelyn Hunter’s 114. Republic was led by Clara Fronabarg’s 95. Nixa’s Shelbi Miller shot 108. Willard’s Haylee Bogner finished at 98.
Team results
Ozark 336
Carthage 352
Webb City 386
Carl Junction 388
Branson 398
Willard 414
Republic 426
Nixa 457
Joplin 491
Individual top 10
Jenna Teeter (Carl Junction) 71
Hailey Bryant (Carthage) 78
Maddie Greerlee (Ozark) 79
Sara Golden (Carthage) 82
Georgia Fraser (Ozark) 83
Sarah Oathout (Webb City) 86
Elizabeth Freeman (Ozark) 87
Maddie Jenkins (Ozark) 87
Rylee Scott (Carthage) 88
Olivia Hanks (Ozark) 92
