The final 36 holes for HHS golfers

For nine Havre Blue Ponies, 36 holes of golf is all that stands between them and the end of the 2015 season. It’s also all that stands between them and individual and team glory.

On Friday and Saturday, the Havre High boys and girls golf teams will play at the Class A state meet, which will be held at the Sidney Country Club, a tree-lined, difficult 18-hole golf course set in the Yellowstone River Valley.

And it’s there that the Havre High boys golf team will attempt to capture its first Class A state championship in more than a decade. And there’s no doubt the Blue Ponies are one of the favorites going in.

“Our boys should be in contention,” said third-year HHS head coach Brett Gilman. “They just have to play to their capabilities.”

If Havre would have qualified as a team a season ago, they would have finished third at the state meet in Hamilton. That rule has since been changed, and now any squad with four players at the state tournament is eligible for a team score. And the Blue Ponies have all four players back from last year’s team. In fact, there’s little doubt Havre has the most experience of any team in the field, considering four of HHS’ five boys in the field this weekend have played in a state tournament every year of their career.

Led by seniors Jerod Boles and Jeff Miller, both playing in their fourth straight state tourney, the Ponies have experience and firepower. Juniors Dustin Haas and Kane Gabrielsen are making their third straight trip to state, and that gives HHS as much experience as any team in Sidney. Individually, any of Havre’s four returning players could also go low at any given time, meaning all four of them have a chance at Class A All-State honors. Junior Aden Passon rounds out Havre’s lineup in Sidney, and while Passon is playing in his first state tournament, he, too, is easily capable of earning all-state accolades, and helping Havre solidify its trophy hunt this weekend.

“This team has a lot of experience,” Gilman said. “They’ve been there at this level before, they know how it works, they know how the pressure feels. And I think they will be able to handle it better than in years past.”

The Ponies do have plenty of talent and plenty of state tournament experience to draw on. But they aren’t the only team in the field that has firepower, and that should make for an interesting state tournament.

Defending champion Hamilton and Eastern A champion Billings Central are both strong teams, and with Havre, are the top three teams to beat. Whitefish and Laurel have also come on strong this season.

Meanwhile, the Blue Pony girls have their sights set on big goals this weekend, too. Havre only finished fourth in the Central A tournament, but the Ponies will still have a team score this weekend, because they qualified four players from the Central A tourney last weekend in Lewistown.

Havre has two experienced seniors in Payton Howard and Randi Gabrielsen, both of whom have played at the state tournament level. The Ponies also have sophomore Grace Litzinger, who played at state a year ago and is coming off the best round of her career last Saturday. Rounding out the HHS girls team is freshman Teagan Fee, who has been improving every week and who will gain loads of experience at this weekend’s tournament — experience she can use going forward.

And that’s the goal for the Ponies, to play their best golf of the season, gain experience and see where they end up when the 36 holes is done.

“The cool thing about the girls is, although they didn’t qualify as a team, we qualified enough girls to have a team score at state,” Gilman said. “They need to just go out and try to shoot the best scores they can and see where they end up. It will be a great experience for all of them.”

On the girls side, the host Sidney Eagles have to be a big favorite this weekend, while defending champion Whitefish and Laurel are teams that could push Sidney as well.

As for past Blue Pony glory, the Havre boys are trying to become the first Pony team since the 2001 and 2002 teams won back-to-back state championships. The Havre girls last claimed the state title in 1991.

But, with golf being an individual and team sport, Gilman said his teams should have one mind-set this weekend, and that’s to each play their best, and see where the scores come in at the end of the tournament.

“Everybody just needs to keep their heads and I think they will do great,” Gilman said. “If you have a rough hole, just move on, keep plugging away at it. That’s what they need to do and they’ll do fine.”

The 2015 Class A state tournament gets underway Friday morning and runs through Saturday at the Sidney Country Club.