The Bradley women’s golf team traveled to the University of Illinois-Chicago this past weekend aiming to bounce back from its previous performance.
The Braves almost did that in a nearly victorious fashion, placing second with a score of 307, six strokes behind champion Southern Illinois.
“I thought we demonstrated a lot of consistency,” women’s golf head coach Mary Swanson said. “I would’ve liked to see some of our top players shoot a little lower, but we hadn’t seen the course before, and the greens were significantly slower than where we’ve played previously. But overall, I thought we adjusted pretty well.”
Senior Danielle Lemek led the charge in the one-day shootout by finishing three over par. It was her 87th career round under 80, which is symbolic of her overall consistent playing style.
“We were talking the other day about her stats, and there’s just nothing glaring,” Swanson said. “Nothing is spectacular, but nothing is a weak point. It’s about overall elevating where she’s at.”
Swanson lauded the work ethic of the women, noting that most players arrive to practice early, stay late and are always eager to get as much work in as possible.
“That’s what it takes over a sustained period of time over the season to be successful,” Swanson said. “They’ve all bought in to what we’re doing with the sports performance staff. There’s just an overall investment.”
The women still have some kinks to work out, but moving forward, Swanson said the key to their success will be “accessing what they already own.”
“It means that…between the experience and the ability of this group [traveling] that I want them to access what they’re capable of doing,” Swanson said.
While the women finished in the top two over the last weekend, the men were three strokes away from a top three finish. The men kicked off their season over the past weekend by finishing fifth out of 18 teams with a score of 893.
“I think it was a good start to the year,” men’s head golf coach Jeff Roche said. “It obviously gave us some things to build upon, some really good things, but also some things to look at to make us better.”
Roche said one of the things he wants to see the team work on is managing emotion. An important key to golf is remaining steady emotionally through the ups and downs of a round.
Freshman Drake Bushong was certainly able to manage his emotions over the weekend, as he finished second overall with a one under 70 in his last outing.
“He played to his strengths and managed his emotion levels,” Roche said. “He had that confidence where if he made a mistake here or there, there was no panic button being pushed. He just kind of kept plodding along.”
In Roche’s office, there is a list of goals he and the team look to accomplish this year. The main goal, which Roche admitted is cliché, is to “continue to keep getting better and better every day.”
“We’ve got some aspiration of things we want to do,” Roche said. “We have one of the deepest teams we’ve had in years past. I think it’s going to push us to be our best.”
The men will compete at the Derek Colenc Inivtational in Edwardsville starting Monday, while the women will play in the Johnie Imes Invitational in Columbia, Missouri on the same day.
