BLOOMINGTON
Trinity Lutheran seniors Chad Stuckwisch and Drew Royalty aren’t done on the links.
While their team fell one place short of advancing, the golfers secured individual regional berths at the Bloomington North Sectional, hosted by Indiana University, on Friday.
Stuckwisch carded a 10-over-par 81 (41-40) while Royalty scored 83 (46-37) on the hot, sunny morning.
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Click here to purchase photos from this gallery“They overcame,” Trinity coach Greg Personett said. “Every time you play tournament golf there’s going to be adversity. They didn’t let nerves or a bad lye effect the rest of their round. We went through some things (Thursday) on short game and long game, and they did that and it paid off.”
Royalty and Stuckwisch will be the first-ever members of the boys’ golf program to compete at the Providence Regional, which will be hosted at Champions Pointe in Henryville on Thursday.
“It’s a pretty good feeling,” Royalty said. “It proves that you just can never give up. I shot 46 on the front and had had two over on the back. I’m really happy with that.”
Former Cougar Parker Criswell qualified for the regional in 2014, but wasn’t able to play due to a prior commitment.
The golfers saw a much different course from Thursday’s practice round.
“They had some pretty tight pins,” Stuckwisch said. “I think they set it up a little longer than what it was like in the practice round. The greens were sloped hard from back to front.
“We’re going to need to shoot a lot better than we did today to advance individually again. We will need to be in the mid-70s.
Brown County’s Parker VanNess had the lowest score of the players not on a top-thre advancing team, shooting 79.
Bloomington South won the sectional by combining for 305 strokes, Bedford North Lawrence was runner-up with 310, Bloomington North placed third with 328 and Trinity was fourth at 348.
Brownstown Central finished seventh in the 11-team field with 382 and Seymour got eighth with 399.
South’s Joe Weiler won a three-hole playoff over teammate Tanner Shapiro for top medalist honors, as both shot 72s on 18 holes.
Outside of their regional qualifiers, Trinity’s Cory Stuckwisch shot 90, Drew Royalty carded 83, Skyler Stahl totaled 94 and Jonathan Keith had 98.
Personett said that even though the team fell short, it doesn’t take away from their 2017 season.
“We’ve had a great season,” he said. “I don’t know how many records the team broke this year, but it’s a lot. I thought it would take at least a 330 or better to get out.
The way the course was set up, fast and firm, it was really tough for our team. I think our team could have performed better, but under 328 would have been tough for our team. Cory had a tough day today. He gave his very best effort but couldn’t get it going. Skyler was a little above his average, but he also gave me best along with Jonathan.”
Slow starts doomed both Seymour and Brownstown Central at IU.
Chanler Fleetwood led the Braves with an 87, followed by Gavin Bane (95), Brayton Hattabaugh (97), Sam Huber (103) and Adam Pottschmidt (124).
“It was a struggle out there,” BC coach Brandon Allman said. “We got off to a rocky start and really struggled with our putts.
“We really enjoyed having (seniors) Chanler and Gavin back this season. We will miss their sense of humor, personalities and leadership. Our younger guys looked up to them. It will be a learning curve with a very young team next year.”
Seymour’s Tyller Bullard led the Owls with 92, Brantley Adams shot 99, Tom Hoffmeier had 101 and Noah Beaty totaled 107.
“We just weren’t mentally prepared,” Seymour coach Jim Hoffman said. “We just tried to hold our own. A lot of teams really struggled with the greens. We will miss our seniors. We just need to get back to it and get ready for next year.”
Crothersville’s Will Amick shot 110 while teammate Brandon Riley scored 155 on the afternoon.
Medora’s Hunter Browning finished his season with a 97.