Lady Demons persevering in tough conference despite numbers concerns
By Mike Ramczyk
Burlington High School varsity girls golf head coach Wayne Herrick sat on the driver’s side of a golf cart Monday afternoon at Rivermoor Golf Course, relaxed and focused on the putting game of Demons’ No. 2 Lily Capozzi.
It was the Racine County Invite, which featured all eight county teams.
Capozzi finished the 9th hole, walked over to Herrick with a smile and gave him a golf club to return to an opponent.
Herrick cracked a joke, Capozzi laughed and returned to her grouping.
It’s this kind of laid-back approach that serves Herrick well, as the Demons show continued improvement this season despite a grand total of eight student-athletes in the four-grade program.
“I don’t like to bother them while they’re playing, and they don’t like it either,” he said. “If they need help, I’m going to scoot around and help them.”
“I think if you over-analyze things, you get paralysis through analysis. You don’t want to give them so many swing thoughts. In practice, we try to train our swing so when we play, we can trust our swing. If we can do that, that’s half the battle.”
On Tuesday afternoon, Burlington fell at Brown’s Lake Golf Course to Lake Geneva Badger, 178-205.
No. 1 golfer Kya Kafar recorded one par and five bogeys to lead Burlington with a 47, while Capozzi added 49.
RaeLee Koehnke (52) and freshman Sage Heelein (57) rounded out the scoring.
Heelein’s steady improvement over the first month of the season has earned her the No. 5 spot.
At No. 4, Hannah Ketterhagen shot a 64.
The Southern Lakes Conference dual came one day after the county invite, which saw Burlington take sixth.
Racine Prairie took the title.
At Rivermoor, Kafar fired a 48, Capozzi added a 50, and Koehnke and Heelein each added 53s.
“We’re still working on a lot of little nuances of the game, especially the short game and putting,” Herrick said. “If we can get better at that, our scores will drop. The short game is one of the harder aspects of the game.”
Herrick said he was shooting for fifth place at Monday’s tournament.
Burlington won the invite in Herrick’s first season, 14 years ago.
Herrick said it’s been challenging with eight girls, the lowest number in his career.
“It’s not just Burlington, it’s several schools in the SLC,” Herrick said. “I don’t think golf is as popular as it used to be among young girls. I don’t see kids playing out at Brown’s Lake as much.”
“Volleyball’s really big. There’s club for soccer, softball, and others. And yet, we don’t do that. I’m a firm believer that girls should be playing one sport during the season. It disrupts the thought process and muscle memory.”
What will it take to increase numbers?
“The schools that are really good have girls playing golf in the summers at country clubs,” Herrick said. “For youths, golf courses are very accommodating. But you just don’t see kids playing and practicing like years ago.”
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