Jefferson Hagen / MacEwan Athletics
EDMONTON – To kick off their special 10th anniversary season, the MacEwan Griffins golf team gathered together with several past alumni for a mini team exhibition tournament last weekend.
Considering Griffins golf teams have won 11 Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference banners in the past nine years, the weekend was as much of a bridge between honouring the past and preparing for future success. It was a passing of the torch, if you will, between eras of MacEwan Griffins.
"We're really excited and proud as well," said head coach Jodi Campbell. "It's gone by really quickly. We were able to kick things off last weekend with an exhibition tournament where we had four different men's teams playing and two different women's teams playing. We called in a bunch of alumni. We just had an absolute blast.
"It was a cool opportunity to incorporate some of our old veterans and our current players in the same event. I'm really proud to be able to say that we not only have the team going into our 10th season, but we've also experienced a lot of success over that time, too."
With that said, the goals remain the same as the Griffins kick off another banner hunt in 2018 with the first event of the season this weekend – the North Regional in Lac La Biche. Rounds 1 and 2, hosted by Portage College, run on Saturday and Sunday.
"The first regional tournament is really about getting everyone's feet wet," said Campbell. "We had two good weeks of practice, so in many ways it's about having an opportunity for the players to put some of those concepts into play. The first regional tournament is a perfect opportunity for that.
"Expectations are that they're going to start to follow a process that might be new to them. If they can stick to the process and put a good effort forward, that's going to be very telling for how the rest of the season's going to go."
Returner Hailey Turcotte will be joined by newcomers Jordan Hoyda and Skylar Thompson as MacEwan's entry into the women's team event. The top two scores count towards the team total each day.
On the men's side, fifth-year veterans Josh Gorieu and Christian Solkowski will headline MacEwan's five-man team entry in Lac La Biche, while returners Noah Lubberding and Justin Berget, and rookie Reid Woodman round out the squad. The squad's top four scores each day count towards their team total.
First-years Jarrett Bossert and Jack Nessel will also get a chance to test their mettle in a team concept with the first-ever ACAC mixed event. A pilot project last season, there will be a mixed trophy up for grabs at the ACAC Championship later this fall. Gorieu's, Turcotte's and Hoyda's score will also factor into the mixed competition (top two men and top woman count each round).
All players will also compete for men's and women's individual titles.
The Griffins will be without rookie Connor Ackroyd for the first event as he's representing Canada at the Maple Leaf Junior Golf Tour's Nordic Junior Team matches in Estonia.
With snow falling in recent days across northern Alberta, the Griffins have had to prepare for potential inclement, or at the very least, cold weather this weekend.
"We've definitely talked about it. Even our practices this week have not only been focused on working on their game, but it's about having that conversation around things you can control and things you can't control," said Campbell. "Unfortunately, one of the things you can't control is weather. In many ways, you have to decide beforehand I'm going to take on the challenge, nothing's going to bother me today and tee it up and go."
