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Oh, Golf, the sport that can bore people to tears and drive others into anger management. Some call it the oldest game, but I just call it an excuse to drink beer at 3 in the afternoon. At Carleton, the collegiate game is a mystery to most students, so I will give a quick explanation. In an official golf tournament typically five golfers enter, while only four of those scores count towards the overall cumulative score. The team with the lowest score wins, simple, right? Well, not so much to the normal person who hits five balls into the woods every round.
Luckily, the Carleton Women’s golf team does not consist of normal golfers. Last year they won the MIAC championship setting a course record of 299 strokes, average of 74. This year they finished second to St. Thomas and are looking to improve on their strong season in the spring. But, golf has always been an individual sport. Each player is on their own, regardless of the score of a team.
The leader of the girls team is Grace Gilmore, the back-to- back MIAC individual champion. She is the tone setter for the team and is quietly having one of the best collegiate golf careers in Carleton’s history. I sat down with her to ask a couple of questions about the team and her experience winning the MIAC Championship:
Owen: So tell me how you would describe the team? Not many people know a lot about the women’s golf team.
Grace: The team is very close knit and really fun to be around. We spend a lot of time traveling and staying in hotels, so we have naturally become really close. On the course we are all separated in different pairings, so unless we are at practice the sport can be pretty isolated. That means the team is pretty separated, but we come back together after.
Owen: So you have won the MIACS two years in a row, were you more nervous this year or last?
Grace: I was much more nervous this time around. Last year I played extremely well on the last day and won. Where as this year, I had a 4-stroke lead going into the final day, and I felt more pressure to hold on. In the middle of my round, I bogeyed 3 out of 4 Holes between 11-14, so I felt very anxious. But my Coach helped calm me down and I was able to come through.
Owen: Do you think Nationals is realistic for the team or individually?
Grace: Nationals is always a possibility, we will have to win an at-large bid in the spring, which is extremely complex, but we have put ourselves in a shot to make it. And individually is also a shot, but I just have to play well. It all depends on the spring.
The remarkable thing about the girls golf team, and Grace, is that they don’t get much, if any, recognition. The women’s golf team is the only fall team, other than girls cross country, on campus with back-to-back years of MIAC success, and they are built for the future. Two of their freshmen were All MIAC and placed in the top 10. This team is only going to get better and more exciting to watch.
Unfortunately, unless you live at Scott House or have Twitter (@carletonwgolf), golf is not an easy sport to follow. Their team travels all over the Midwest for tournaments, which makes it hard for the normal college student to watch. However, their twitter page has become a place for real time video highlights, which is perfect for the casual fan.
This is a team that no one pays attention to, but we should all start. Golf may bore you, but this type of success doesn’t come around all the time. It’s time to start recognizing greatness and supporting arguably the most successful team on campus. Womens’ golf is here to stay.