With ESD crown in tow, Aberdeen Central enters AA state golf meet as one of the favorites
Heading into the season, the goal for the Aberdeen Central girls golf team was to be playing well heading into the postseason.
Check.
The Golden Eagles are coming off of a first-place finish at the Eastern South Dakota Conference tournament. In Olivia Braun, Leah Gough and Emma Dohrer, three Central golfers finished in the top six.
It was the program's first conference crown since winning back to back in 2017 and 2018.
Earlier this week, the Eagles placed second at the Lynx Invitational in Brandon, two strokes behind Yankton.
While golf is an individual sport, the squad has preached teamwork throughout the season, said coach Kim Zimmerman.
"We really have emphasized the team spirit, just kind of bonding together, and that's how you get things accomplished is through that teamwork, that effort and being positive," Zimmerman said. "I'm not going to deny it, we've had some great individual performances by each one of the girls, actually, which is a nice accomplishment. But when I look back on it so far, I look at the invites that we've gone to and that we've won and it's been a team effort from top to bottom ... You have to have four good scores to win, so we've been able to do that and hopefully we'll continue."
The Golden Eagles have won tournaments in Huron, Aberdeen, Mitchell, Brookings and Watertown this season.
State title race should be tight
"We've had some great accomplishments so far, but you look back and you don't win state tournaments and you don't do well at the state tournament by your regular season (performances). You still have to go out and perform, and we have to do that come next Monday and Tuesday..." Zimmerman said. "Moving forward, it's going to be competitive, I don't foresee it changing. It's going to come down to just a few strokes, and if it doesn't, I'll be surprised."
The AA girls state tournament will be in Brookings, where Central won an invitational earlier in the season, besting Sioux Falls O'Gorman by nine strokes.
That experience should help the Golden Eagles.
"I'm a person that has the philosophy that the more you play a course, the more comfortable you are with it. It's not saying you're going to do well, but I just think you kind of have your sidelines, you have your yardage, you know where the trouble spots are at. You're more familiar with the greens," Zimmerman said. "It's just a whole combination of things that I think plays a role in that and it's just a positive. The more you can play a course, I think the better off you are, especially at a state tournament course."
He thinks a finish anywhere in the top five is realistic.
"Obviously, we've shown that throughout the course of the year. I don't think it's any secret, all the other teams in the state that have gone to these invites know who the top teams and top individuals are based on the scores and outcomes of those tournaments. I think there's about five teams that you could probably put them in a hat and draw them out," Zimmerman said.
Other teams that could potentially contend for the title include Rapid City Stevens, Mitchell, Harrisburg and O'Gorman, he said.
Youth has been a strength for Eagles
Hayley Wirebaugh is Central's lone senior, while Gough is a junior and Morgan Jones is a sophomore. Braun, often the top player on the team, is an eighth-grader, as is Dohrer. Kyley Wirebaugh is just a seventh-grader.
The younger girls "have really helped us out a bunch this year. I mean, we've kind of relied on their scores for the most part of the year. So, you know, it's one thing to have a young team, but it's another thing to have a team that you're looking forward to the future, but at the same time, we're using those scores right now," Zimmerman said.
Braun, Dohrer, Gough and Kyley Wirebaugh have settled in as the top four golfers on the squad. Hayley Wirebaugh and Jones will round out the team at the state meet, which opens Monday at the Brookings Country Club.
"We're excited about it. We're looking forward to it, the opportunity, the challenges. I told the girls just the other day, 'This is what you play and practice for during the season, during the offseason, you spend time in the classroom when it's cold outside and going over things,'" Zimmerman said. "This is the end goal. We've accomplished one of those in our conference tournament, and we're still enjoying that feat, but now we're looking ahead, and we're just gonna take it day by day and see how it plays out. But, we're not overconfident, we still know there's some very good teams, very good individuals out there."
This article originally appeared on Aberdeen News: Aberdeen Central girls golf eye state tournament after ESD title
