BOYS GOLF: Lake Orion puts its all together for first state title
Orion’s Sui earns medalist honors; Clarkston lands sixth
BY DAN STICKRADT
CORRESPONDENT
dan.stickradt@northoaklandsports.com
Twitter: @LocalSportsFans
FRANKENMUTH — Monty Gallaher didn’t want to break away from routine this season.
So regardless if a road tournament was one or two days of competition — nearby or far away — he always had his players drive home after the first round and return the second day.
“I wanted them to sleep in their own beds and be normal, be in their normal routine,” said Gallaher, who has coached for 18 non-consecutive years at Lake Orion. “For the state finals, I made them go home and be with their families and drive back up the next day. I did it for the (West Branch Invitational) as well. Frankenmuth was only an hour away, so I felt there was no reason for them to stay up here. I wanted them to relax. Over the years, we’ve played in tournaments in Ohio or northern Michigan and spent the night, then came back and didn’t play well the second day. I made an executive decision that with Frankenmuth being so close and we finished up in the afternoon (Friday), there was no reason to have them stay up there.”
Lake Orion celebrates its first Division 1 state title at The Fortress in Frankenmuth.
State-ranked Lake Orion, which finished an all-time best eighth at the Division 1 state finals in 2008, returned to the state finals June 7-8 at Frankenmuth’s The Fortress Golf Course and came away with its very first state title in the sport of boys golf.
“It’s been a long time coming,” smiled Gallaher. “we had all of those years where we just missed qualifying. I think every year from 2010 to 2012 we were fourth at the regional and missed by a couple of strokes each time and we were sixth (at the regional) the year after that. I think the only other year we made before last year it out was 2002. Even though we hosted regionals several times over the years, we had some good teams but missed out. So to finally do this is amazing.”
Lake Orion held a 10-stroke lead after the first day, as the Dragons’ play-five, count-four team score of 294 was better than Novi Detroit Catholic Central’s 304. Lake Orion ended up carding a 312 on the second day (4 strokes behind Rockford’s 308), but ended up with a two-day, 11-stroke victory over state runner-up Grosse Pointe South, the 2018 state champion.
The Dragons put together a two-day total of 606, followed by Grosse Pointe South (617), Rockford (621), Catholic Central (623), Hartland (624), Clarkston (626), Birmingham Brother Rice (628), Bloomfield Hills (646), Warren DeLaSalle (648) and Caledonia (650) in the top 10 of the 18-school field.
COURTESY PHOTO | MHSAA
Lake Orion’s Justin Sui earned medalist honors thanks to a two-hole playoff with Grosse Pointe South’s Coalter Smith. Both shot rounds of 71 and 70 (141 totals) and had to go out to play the additional two holes for the gold medal.
Sui sank a 10-foot putt for an even-par on the 10th holw, while Smith carded a five on the hole.
Drew Coble (70-75—145), Andrew Remer (76-83–159), Zach Hay (77-84—161) and Andres Navarro (84-89—173) also competed for the Dragons.
Coble tied for fourth in the medalist standings, Remer tied for 32nd and Hay tied for 39th in the field of 90 golfers to wrap up the scoring for Lake Orion.
Playing with the 10-hole lead led to some calm nerves Saturday and the Dragons overcame the wind to maintain their comfortable advantage.
“I told the kids that the clubs and balls don’t know that it’s the state finals,” said Gallaher. “Just go out there, relax, and play the way you have been playing. I knew if we did that we’d win.”
Lake Orion did not have its entire team until the final month of the season. The Dragons won the West Branch Invitational, Oakland County Division I Tournament, Twin Lakes Regional and state finals down the stretch.
“We didn’t have our top five players until the last month,” said Gallaher. “We had an exchange student who started out slow. Remer is a really good travel hockey player and his hockey team kept winning, so he didn’t really play with us until the West Branch tournament at the Nightmare (Golf Course). Once we had everyone back, we really started to play well and I knew that this could be possible.”
Clarkston, which spent half of the season ranked No. 1 in Division 1, shot rounds of 310 and 316 to finish sixth. The Wolves were fourth after the first round.
Harry Bowman (77-77—154), Patrick Deardorff (79-78—157), Cole Smaka (78-81—159), Noah Bridgeman (81-80—161) and Alex Oda (76-88—164) competed for Clarkston.
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