The Steamboat Pilot & Today

Coaches Steve Dodson and Scott Berry understand this year’s Steamboat Springs High School golf team is a little raw, but that hasn’t dampened their vision of what the Sailors can accomplish.

The team stepped onto the green grass of Haymaker Golf Course on Monday to become the first Steamboat team to begin the fall 2008 season.

“We’ve got a lot of raw talent,” Dodson said. “I guess we are looking for a couple of diamonds in the rough.”

Gone are Sailors Michael Weston and Billy Taylor, who both graduated last spring. Dodson hopes the state qualifying team’s remaining members, Scott Ptach and Kaelen Gunderson, can lead the team this season. Both players are juniors.

Ptach said he misses his former teammates but knows that if the team is going to be successful it will need other players to fill the gaps.

“I’m excited for this season,” Ptach said. “We are going to need some players to step it up, but we’ve been there before.”

A year ago, it was Ptach and Gunderson who rose from the ranks to gain starting roles. This season, there is another talented group of players hoping to prove they belong.

“Do work, son,” Gunderson advised his teammates as he looks to reclaim his starting role.

Dodson said none of the varsity positions have been decided and that the team still has a lot to work out before the first tournament of the season Thursday in Battlement Mesa.

“The whole season is jam packed,” Berry said. “I think we play 11 tournaments in seven weeks.”

So the team will use two 18-hole rounds and a series of skills tests scheduled for today to figure out which players will travel for Thursday’s opener. Those same golfers are expected to travel to tournaments at the Bookcliff and Tiara Rado golf courses in Grand Junction next Monday and Tuesday.

Dodson said the varsity lineup will be announced Wednesday, but the junior varsity and development players will not be named until Thursday afternoon.

The mix of players competing for positions will include a large class of freshman players who will be taking their first swings and at least three seniors, including Ben Von Thaden, Jace Hvambsal and Jimmy Whelihan.

“This is my fourth year on the team, and I’m playing pretty well right now” Hvambsal said. “I think if I put in the work that I should have a good shot at making the team this season.”

The coaches are excited about the competitive nature of this week’s practices. According to the coaches, this part of the season usually brings out the best in the players. Just because a player fails to make the five-man varsity team doesn’t mean he should give up. The varsity and junior varsity teams might swap players at any point of the season, and it is possible to move up from the development team, as well.

Steamboat has qualified for the state tournament as a team the past six years. But that doesn’t mean the coaches or players are taking state for granted. This season, Montrose and Cortez are expected to be strong, and there’s a chance only one 4A team from the Western Slope will be invited to the state tournament.

“It’s going to be a lot harder this time around,” Dodson said. “But that’s the way it is, and if we want to get back, we are going to have to win.”

— To reach John F. Russell call 871-4209 or e-mail jrussell@steamboatpilot.com