Whitefish senior Ella Shaw won a playoff over Corvallis’ Macee Greenwood and the Bulldogs girls took home the team title at the Western A Divisional golf tournament on Sept. 26 at King Ranch Golf Course in Frenchtown.
Shaw and Greenwood both shot 85 on the first 18 holes before the pair went back to play the par-3 18th a second time. Greenwood made bogey and Shaw got up-and-down from off the green for par to win the tournament. The senior was third in the state last year — 16 strokes behind Greenwood, who finished second — and she will be joined at the upcoming Class A state tournament by a strong group of teammates looking to improve on their second-place team finish a year ago.
Whitefish’s team title at the divisional tourney this year was its second in a row, with Anyah Cripe (6th), Megan Archibald (9th), Anna Elm (10th) and Kendall Reed (15th) rounding out the Bulldogs lineup. The Bulldogs’ team total was 379, with Corvallis (391) second and Frenchtown (413) in third.
Junior Cameron Kahle won his first divisional tournament on the boys side, doing so in comfortable fashion, besting the field by seven strokes with a round of 72. Kahle, who was the runner-up at last year’s state tourney, led the Whitefish boys to a second-place team finish at this year’s divisional, with their 335 trailing only champion Hamilton (324). Freshman Johnny Nix finished 7th (82) and senior Andrew Brozek (87) was 14th for the Bulldogs. Columbia Falls placed fourth in the team standings with a 355 total, led by top-15 finishers Tyler Langton (5th), Marcus Kilman (11th) and Cody Brothwell (14th).
The divisional tournament was moved up two days because of the impending winter storm, so the state qualifiers will have a couple extra days off before the Class A state tournament, Oct. 3-4 at Laurel Country Club.