Panther men’s golf is through to the 3A West Regional.
Entering the final round of the Mountain Seven Tournament, Franklin ranked second on the conference leaderboard, traveling to Springdale Country Club April 29 for the last 18 holes. In tying conference champions Pisgah on the Black Bears’ home course in Canton, Ryan Raby’s team finished as Mountain Seven runners-up.
“That was the only match all year that Tanner [Jones] did not finish with the lowest score for our team, but we still tied with Pisgah,” said Raby of the final round at Springdale. “Statistically speaking, our best golfer had his worst day of the year and we still tied with them, so that just kind of shows you what kind of team we have.”
Having shot the lowest score of any team in most of Franklin’s matches this season, the Panthers’ star sophomore finally came back to Earth at Springdale. Such has been Jones’ dominance that an eight-over-par score of 80 constitutes an “off” round by his standards, even while ranking as the fourth-best score in the conference.
Shooting Franklin’s low round and the third-best conference-wide was junior Max McClure, who finished with a 78 behind Pisgah’s Matthew Mehaffey and Micah Devlin. Junior Cole Martin shot Franklin’s third-lowest round at 82, followed closely by senior Ashton Shope’s 83. Junior Gabe Stilwell rounded out the Panthers’ scorecard with an 87.
As a team Franklin’s top four scores added up to 323 strokes, tying them with Pisgah for the low final round overall. The Panthers’ scores across all three rounds added up to 959, just 14 strokes behind first-place Pisgah’s 945. Tuscola finished in a distant third with 1,042, while none of Smoky Mountain, East Henderson or West Henderson cracked 1,100.
“Max had an uncharacteristically bad day at Sky Valley in the first round – he shoots an 89 and then turns around and has been in the 70s for the second and third rounds. So that was a heck of a bounce-back by him, and I expect that to continue,” said Raby. “Ashton has just been as steady as he always is, shooting in the low 80s. Cole, same thing- he’s been steady Eddy in the mid-to-low 80s. Gabe was a little bit higher than he had been [at Springdale], but those two kids right there are pretty darn close to being 10 strokes less on their nine-hole average than what they were last year.”
In finishing among the tournament’s top 14 golfers, Franklin’s entire top five earned All-Conference honors, with Jones placing second overall at 230 strokes. McClure and Shope finished sixth and seventh with 244 and 246 respectively, while Stilwell and Martin tied for ninth with 248. As one of the conference tournament’s top three teams Franklin advanced to the 3A West Regional, which was also held at Springdale May 7.
“I told the guys the other day that in three rounds of the conference tournament, we’ve dropped a different person’s score in each round. So, we’re really well-rounded, and a lot of people have pulled a lot of weight in those three rounds,” said Raby. “That’s super-encouraging, and I feel good about things heading into this regional tournament next week. I still feel like we’re a team on the rise. I don’t think we’ve peaked yet, and if they can stay patient and believe in that I think we’ve got a good chance to qualify [for the 3A State Championship May 13-14] – if not the whole team, then at least one or two guys.”
Having already played Springdale several times this season, the Mountain Seven should have a distinct advantage at regionals, which teed off after press time Tuesday morning. With rain forecast in Canton over the weekend however, Raby said the course might play a bit differently than they’re used to.
“Springdale keeps their greens really firm and really fast, which is not uncommon in the golf world, but they were to the point where it was like, ‘Holy smokes, these things are like playing on concrete,’” said Raby. “I said, ‘This is gonna be a great bonus for us, because we’ve played them and we know what to expect – we know [from] what greens we can go to the pin and [from] what greens we can’t.’ But, I think it’s supposed to rain all weekend, so they might soften back up and be to a point where they’ll receive some shots better; we’ll just have to see. We’ll go over there Monday afternoon and play a practice round, and then turn around, go back and tee off at eight o’clock in the morning on Tuesday.”