By Cassie Fuller
IV Leader Sports Editor, Sept. 13, 2007
Although the IVCC Golf Team may seem inexperienced—recruiting mostly freshman and appointing a new coach— their success on the course proves the opposite.
Coach Tommy Canale has high hopes for the Eagles, wanting them to finish in the top two teams in the region so they can advance to nationals. It won’t be an easy road to success as the Eagles compete against schools like Blackhawk.
“Blackhawk is the team to beat in our region as they are 9 deep this year and have posted some really great scores,” Canale explained.
But that is not to say the least about IVCC’s golf team. Recently, the Eagles placed 6th in a meet of 15 teams at the Blackhawk invitational, which is a success since Canale notes that most of the teams were from four-year colleges.
“We have a good core group of players that bond well with each other and help each other out, which leads to picking up each other during a meet when someone is having an off day, that alone could lead us to nationals,” Canale stated.
“We have Carson Greene and Dallas Sherrard from Indiana that have a lot of potential and depending on how hard they work they could become really good. Robert Arnold from Princeton has played solid all year and has great touch around the greens and Mason
Kimberly from Princeton has shown some great signs of being a great player as well, and overall we have a great group of guys.”
Canale, a new addition to the team, has had plenty of experience in competitive golf to directly influence the team. He has been playing for 30 years of his life, and teaching the sport for about 10.
“I love the game of golf and enjoy teaching it as well. It is thrill to me to watch players become better over time and to have the chance to assist them in the journey in the game of golf is appealing to me.”
The Eagles face many more challenges this fall with the State Tournament on Sept. 9 and 10, and the Region IV tournament in Byron in October.