By Olivia Janis
The Varsity Boys golf team had a very accomplished season last year, winning state and placing in other tournaments. This year the team has six seniors, ready to be team leaders and lead the team to another state championship.
Most Lovett students (including me) do not know what normal golf practice looks like. With the help of Coach Greer, sophomore Park Howell, junior Ryan Ode, senior Jack Shaifer, senior Zidan Ajani, and senior Avi Daftari, they painted a pretty good picture of their practices.
About twice a week after school at around 3:20 the students take a bus to go to Dogwood golf course. Typically they play 9 holes in groups of two or three. Jack says some days are more serious than others. The other two days of the week are workout days and meeting days.
“Sometimes we do stroke play and we are just playing against everybody. Or sometimes we do some fun events and play with partners, and play scrambles,” said Zidan.
For Ryan, practice is actually his favorite part of being on the golf team. “It’s basically just going out with your buddies one weekend and playing, except it’s our practice,” he said.
Zidan and Ryan made sure to mention that even though they have such a fun time, they know when to take it seriously.
“Just the other day, we were taking it seriously, because our games were pretty dialed, both of us. Obviously, him being the senior, I want to beat him, but we always have friendly competitions and good trash talk,” said Ryan.
Park mentioned how if it does rain, Lovett has recently installed a golf simulator near the baseball fields, where they can practice their hits.
Now that I had a better understanding of what a golf practice looks like, I started to ask questions to get to know the golf players.
Sophomore Park Howell started playing golf when he was seven or eight but did not start to play seriously until Covid hit, when he was around the age of 13. Because all team sports got canceled, Park began to go out and play golf more, making it his main sport. He stopped all of his other sports and started to play in tournaments.
Even though he is just a sophomore, college seems to always be on everyone’s mind, so when I asked him about playing in college, he said, “It depends how my summer goes, but it is definitely on my mind to try to. It’s the goal, but if it doesn’t work out then we move on.”
Park was a freshman when they won the State Championship last year, and he thinks this year they have a very high chance to go to state again. “There is more competition this year because there are four state champions in four A, so it will be hard to win,” he said.
This season Park’s goal is to win or play well in one of the tournaments and to have a successful season.
Park believes that their team dynamic last year best helped them get to state. “Even though we had a rough day one, we were able to have a really good 2nd day together and swing out the victory,” he said.
Park recalled that before tournaments last year, Coach Greer gave him some good advice, which is to stay focused and try to do your best, and also when you are playing not to focus too much on the score, but to focus on hitting your next best shot.”
Park mentioned that this year the team has many senior leaders, like Avi Daftari, Jack Shaifer, and Zidan Ajani.
Jack has been playing golf since he was seven years old. When he was 12 he started playing tournaments. Jack has thought about playing golf in college, but he doesn’t think he would play because it is too much of a commitment. His highlight from last season was winning their first tournament, The Billy Peak Invitational, in April.
Winning their first tournament “helped us go into regions with a lot more confidence,” he said.
This season, his goal is to make Allstate because last year he was an honorable mention, and also wants to win the state championship again this year. Jack acknowledged that having previous players on the team who had won state last year had helped them win state. Lucky for the team this year, they have players who can help do the same.
However, having veterans on the team was not the only thing that helped them win state, “a lot of younger guys who wanted to prove themselves, freshman “ was another motivation to win the State championship. “We were all hungry for a ring,” he added.
Jack describes the team as super loose but focused.
“We are more focused now because we’ve been there and won a state championship and it is something we all want to do again,” he said.
Avi is another senior on the varsity golf team and he had been playing golf since freshman year. Similar to Park he took up the sport during the Covid era.
One highlight he had last season was winning the state championship and doing well at the Laurel Springs tournament which was a Longhorn invitational hosted by Lasser. He tied in the top three.
Avi told me that Coach Greer knows his players well enough to know which players like to be talked to or given advice during tournaments. Personally, Avi says advice mid-tournament distracts him; however, other players were able to quote the inspiring things coach Greer says to them.
“No matter how bad you’re playing, treat it like a new round,” Jack said, quoting Coach Greer.
“He will never be too caring about what your swing is and he is someone who understands that we know our game better than a lot of people and basically everyone, but he is really there to be your support coach. He is here to help you with course management and he always tells me to stay in it,” said Ryan.
Avi says that Coach Greer is a great mentality coach and offers a lot of reassurance during tournaments.
Senior Zidan Ajani and Junior Ryan Ohde are both good leaders on the team. Ryan is following in his family’s footsteps, and continuing to play golf like his father did. He started playing golf seriously when he was ten. Unlike Ryan, Zidan has no family history with golf, but started playing when he was three or four and started competing in tournaments around age six.
“I fell in love with the game, and I have been playing ever since,” said Zidan.
Zidan’s goal is to continue to play golf when he gets to college no matter what college he goes to, while Ryan doesn’t see himself playing seriously, but if the opportunity comes he wouldn’t pass it off.
Both Zidan and Ryan shared the same highlight, which was winning the state championship. Just talking about the win brought smiles to their faces and reminded them of what had occurred that day.
“We did not play well the first day and we were behind Pace. Then the 2nd day it was our best round of golf ever,” said Ryan.
Ryan said he was the first to finish that day, and the coach had given him a cart so that he could go around and support each one of his teammates.
I asked them what they thought most helped them get to state and Ryan said, “Our drive. The idea of not letting outside voices and not letting doubt get to ourselves. I think especially since we are coming off a state championship, it is important to make the claim that that was not just a one-time thing, but something that our program is going to be here, and we are going to make the claim that we are best in the state.”
Like Jack had said previously, Zidan, being a veteran on the team, acknowledged that younger guys were really stepping up. He said when he was a sophomore he got pulled up to varsity and had to really fight for his spot.
“Ryan, Park, and John, all three of them, honestly won us the state championship because those bottom three scores won us the six, and won us that tournament,” said Zidan.
Collectively, all the players I interviewed agreed that this year it would be harder to make state.
“Our region is going to be a lot better this year,” said Jack.
The varsity boys golf team has had the opportunity to really bond with each other.
Zidan said he’s “played with them on the team, outside school, and in tournaments. There’s a really competitive spirit on the team and we are all trying to beat each other, which I love.”
Zidan and Ryan talked about this week’s practice and how playful they can be during practice.
“We like to have our mini tournaments inside of practice which is all in a friendly spirit,” he said.
Zidan chimed in saying, “Golf is such an individual sport and that’s why I love high school golf, because I never got a team aspect to any part of golf since I was six. It’s all been individual until now.”
The varsity boys golf team is looking very strong. This is the first year in Lovett history they can make a 3 or 4 (re)peats (winning three/four consecutive state championships).
The last question I asked to wrap up all the interviews was, “How do you feel playing a sport that senior citizens play?” While this question was a little of a blow to the chest, all the players took it as a joke and answered very adequately.
“I love it. Who can say they can play their sport since they were 6 to 80,” said Zidan. “You can travel anywhere and play. I’ve played with a lot of senior citizens, and just know that it’s not just about playing golf with them but learning all the stories that they have with them.”
Ryan agreed. “I personally love it for that fact,” he said. “A lot of my friends say that playing in college is a goal for them and in a lot of those cases that’s about it because for a lot of sports, such as baseball there is not much you can do after either high school and college, but for a sport like golf it’s something that you can always have your buddies go play. My grandpa goes and plays every weekend with his group of friends and those are his tightest friends. It’s just about creating those relationships that you can keep forever.”
