Lady Pirates golfers get ready to tee off the 2018 season

The Polson High School girl’s golf coach Bill Owen hopes to build off their second-place finish in Montana High School Association Divisionals in 2017.

“I was really pleased with our performance last season,” Owen said. “We were a little bit inexperienced last year.”

One of the Lady Pirates’ key golfers Berkley Ellis elected not to participate in golf and to concentrate on volleyball this year, but Owen and the Polson team should have plenty of other golfers to pick up the slack.

“Berkeley was a pretty good player for me,” Owen said. “osing her at the start of the season hurt a little bit.”

The Lady Pirates will return their best finisher Cali Cannon, who hopes to become a state placer this year.

“Oh yeah, she’s been pretty steady and we think that we can get her to a state place this year because she has the potential to be a state placer,” Owen said.

Owen said he has two other golfers that can compete with Cannon including Amanda Farley and Esme Yarbrough, another returning state participant.

“My other two players I think can hang with her a little bit,” Owen said. “I have a couple of other girls that are really coming along and I am excited about this season. I feel they are going to have a really good season.”

Unlike previous years, the Lady Pirates will have enough participants to score five players instead of relying on four to come through. This will give them some protection between the No. 4 and No. 5 golfer this season, according to Owen.

Senior golfer Shawntaya Burland, freshman Katelyn Druyvestein and Ellie Thiel will be three impact golfers, Owen said.

“They all have pretty good attitudes and with only two practices, they’ve been great as far as working and being able to work with their swings,” Owen said. “They are very receptive on improving and they will work on keeping it up. I am excited to have five scores this season and I am hoping we have five girls that could score for our team.”