Revamped Mission Mountain golf course hosts successful scramble

The golf scramble has become one of the events that highlight the annual Ronan Pioneer Days year after year.

This year, newly appointed general manager Shawn Wilson was in the process of creating an even more enhanced experience for golfers for this year’s Pioneer Days and to ensure the Mission Mountain Golf Course is there for future Pioneer Days.

Wilson began the process by having what he referred to as a “successful turnout” for this year’s Pioneer Days that could potentially be the precursor towards building on the tradition and keeping the Mission Valley Golf Course alive in Ronan.

The participants in this year’s events agreed with Wilson’s assessment and are behind his Mission statement to keep the golf culture in Ronan.

“I think Pioneer Days and the golf scramble are great for the community,” golfer Marvin Courville said. “The Mission Mountain course is a really good course and everyone knows everyone. There are a lot of people that have been out here and it’s a very comfortable atmosphere at Mission Mountain. It’s a lot like family.”

Stacy Courville agrees with Marvin’s assessment and has noted the improvements of the Mission Mountain Golf Course that Wilson created.

“This is a new owner and he has already run out of carts this morning,” Stacy Courville said. “It would be huge for the Mission Valley Golf Course to stay open and not turn into a subdivision. What they are doing is cool and it is good to see the community supporting it.”

Courville expressed his confidence in Wilson as the new owner of Mission Valley Golf Course.

“This is the first time I entered in this tournament and it’s been really fun,” Stacy Courville said. “We support anything that Sean does.”

Wilson, who took over the business aspect of the course on April 1, said he was “pleased” with the turnout and the participation of the golf scramble.

“It was late coming and a really good turnout because we ended up with nine teams and 27 golfers,” Wilson said.

Wilson said the success of the scramble was “huge.”

“The turnout was absolutely huge and our course never takes anything for granted,” Wilson said. “We’ve done several tournaments with a full field. We saw a bunch of new faces at the golf scramble. That is our main goal and we were really happy for the turnout for sure.”

The restaurant side of the golf course has had an immediate impact and the golf course is still in the process of bringing back some of the older clientele, according to Wilson.

“Our restaurant side has seen an immediate impact and our chef Scott’s cooking has them coming back again,” Wilson said. “Our restaurant portion of the business is growing faster than we’ve anticipated. The golf course is going to take a few years for golfers to come back but word gets around pretty fast in the golf community. In a couple of years, we anticipate the course to be really busy. We’ve been really happy with our success so far.”

Wilson credited the Pioneer Days committee for making the scramble and Ronan’s annual event a successful one.

“The Pioneer Days did a great job of putting this together and all of the hard work and volunteers were very much appreciated, on my end especially,” Wilson said.