Valparaiso Country Club trees get the best of Chesterton’s inexperienced varsity golfers

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

There have been times that a boys golf team as inexperienced at the varsity level as Chesterton played so well that it begged the question: How did that happen?
May 6 was one of those times. First-year Chesterton golfer Tyler Brown, a senior, shot a 38. Sophomores Jake Bobin and Tyler Racette a 40 and 42, and senior Griffin Stanley a 43 for a season-best nine-hole score of 163, one stroke behind Valparaiso.
Monday at Valparaiso Country Club was not one of those times. It still was appropriate to ask: How did that happen? But the context was decidedly different, and so was the course.
This time the four scores used added up to 191 in a 23-stroke loss to Valpo.
Bobin was low man again with a 44, followed by Brown (49), junior Drew Pacilio (49) and senior Ryan Kasper (53).
Racette, who has been alternating between varsity and JV, also broke 50, shooting a 49 for the JV.
The difference from two weeks ago?
“Nobody played well,” Racette said. “New to the course. There are trees everywhere, so if you didn’t hit it straight, you had to punch out. I don’t think anyone’s played here.”
Now that he has played the course, Racette knows what he would do differently if he plays it again.
“I’d either learn how to hit my driver straight or hit irons off the tee,” Racette said. “There were trees on every edge of the fairway. They were overhanging the fairway. If you don’t hit it straight, you’re right behind the tree.”
Chesterton first-year coach Marc Bruner was encouraged by how the boys played Saturday, when they split the varsity players into tournaments in two different locations.
“Our five or six varsity kids that we’ve been consistent with all played either at their average or better,” Bruner said. “Nobody played worse. I thought we’d come out here and play well and we came out here as flat as we could be from the get-go, from the first holes, and had no ability to rally ourselves and shake off a bad shot or a bad hole.”
The same five players locked up the varsity spots the past two years and made it to the state tournament both seasons, which left the Trojans without a varsity veteran this season.
Chesterton won’t have a roster this inexperienced for the foreseeable future. Bobin, Racette and Pacilio are gaining valuable varsity experience this season, and sophomore Mace Redman, who took up the sport much later than they did had an encouraging varsity debut Saturday. Making his varsity debut in the Leo Invitational at Noble Hawk Golf Course, Redman shot a 97.