Sophomore Jake Bobin fires an 82 to finish fifth as Chesterton exceeds expectations at DAC boys golf tournament, finishing third, edging Valparaiso on a tiebreaker

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

Even on the calmest of days, the layout and slick greens of pristinely manicured Sand Creek Country Club’s three nine-hole courses present a stiff challenge for golfers of all ability ranges. Mix in 20 mph winds gusting to much higher than that and it can become downright cruel.
The wind inflated scores, but didn’t deflate an inexperienced at the varsity level Chesterton boys golf team that exceeded expectations with a third-place finish at the DAC tournament Tuesday afternoon, played on the Creek and Marsh nines.
Medalist Cooper Kroncke of Lake Central, who shot a 78, and teammate Tyler Morton, 79, were the only golfers to break 80, followed by Valparaiso’s Colin Kaleth, 80, and Crown Point’s Nolan Babcock, 81.
Chesterton’s Jake Bobin, consistently the team’s low man over the second half of the season, cracked the top five with an 82, and he’s just a sophomore.
The Trojans didn’t return a single player from the five-man lineup that stayed the same the past two seasons and made it to the state tournament in 2023 and 2024.
Early in the season, Chesterton played like a team without any returners. Since then, the Trojans have shown significant improvement under first-year head coach Marc Bruner and assistant Matt Plawecki.
The coaches giving equal attention to players up and down the roster all season paid dividends at the tournament.
Team scores are calculated by adding the top four finishers’ scores together. Yet, coaches forever stress to every player to stay focused through 18 holes, no matter how poorly you think you’re playing, because when the first four scores result in a tie, the fifth is used to break the deadlock. Such was the case Tuesday.
LC placed first with a 333, Crown Point second with a 343, just as far ahead of the next best scores as behind LC. The scores of seniors Griffin Stanley (86), Tyler Brown (90) and Ryan Kasper (95), plus Babin’s 82, totaled 353.
So did the scores of Valparaiso’s Alex Aicorn (89), Reid Carlson (89) and Will Nowarita (95) when added to Kaleth’s 80.
Hello tiebreaker, goodbye Valpo.
Chesterton junior Drew Pacilio, who did such strong work on the gridiron in the fall in his first year as a placekicker, shot a 98, not his best score, but plenty good enough to break the tie in the Trojans’ favor. The Vikings’ fifth-best score came in at 104.
Next stop for the Trojans is Forest Park in Valparaiso for a sectional that tees off Friday at 9 a.m. Boone Grove, East Chicago Central, Bishop Noll, Hammond Morton, Hobart, Portage, Valparaiso, Wheeler, River Forest and Whiting join Chesterton in a field that isn’t as strong as the competition the Trojans faced in the DAC tournament. The top three teams, plus the three low individuals from a non-advancing team, advance to the regional at Sandy Pines, Thursday, June 12 at 8 a.m.
Friday’s forecast for Valparaiso calls for a high of 72 and winds ranging from 5 to 10 mph, so the scores should be lower, provided the golfers don’t let Forest Park’s tight, funky back nine pitch a tent in their heads.
At least the course itself won’t be competing with wind for space between the ears.
Wind blowing in the correct direction is a 100-meter sprinter’s best friend but ranks high on the enemy’s list of most athletes. It blows predictability away, which eats away at even the most detailed preparation.
“You have to think so much more because so much more can happen,” Brown said after a round he reviewed with “it could have gone better, but it also could have gone worse.”
The difficulties that wind introduces to a round extend beyond having to hit into it and onto the greens.
“The wind made it more confusing as well,” Brown said of putting. “It would move the ball.”
The toughest impact of the wind?
“When you get trees, the wind swirls, so it can change direction,” said Brown, who took up golf not quite two years ago. “I was on Creek 8, and I clubbed up because it was into the wind, and I ended up hitting over the green because the wind switched.”
He made par from there, so he wasn’t making an excuse for a bad hole.
Onto Forest Park the Trojans go in search of a sectional title.
“I shot my lowest score on their front nine, 38, but their back nine is a little bit rough,” Brown said. “I think I shot 42, which is eight over.”
Chesterton seeks its 11th sectional title and first since 2018. Valpo, which will be playing on its home course, won last year’s sectional with a 313, three strokes ahead of Chesterton.
The Vikings also lost a lot to graduation a year ago. Kaleth is the lone returner from the team that finished 11th at state, three spots ahead of Chesterton.
Still, Valpo performed well in the regular season, making Chesterton’s tourney finish quite an accomplishment.
The DAC computes its final standings by combining DAC tournament results with the double round robin from the regular season schedule. The team that wins the DAC tourney adds a 7-0 record to its double round robin record, the second-place team a 6-1, and so on through the eighth-place finisher at the tourney, which adds an 0-7 record.
The final standings, after all that arithmetic: 1. Lake Central 19-2; 2. Crown Point 18-3; 3. Valparaiso 15-6; 4. Chesterton 11-10; 5. LaPorte 8-13; 6. Portage 7-14; 7. Michigan City 6-15; 8. Merrillville 0-21.