Lady Tiger golfers fare well at Districts

Lakyn Mansfield capped off a surprising day at the district tournament for the Nevada Lady Tigers on Monday with a bid to the state tournament.

The Lady Tigers were expected to finish third or fourth in the tournament as a team and probably qualify two or even up to four individual players for state. Instead, Nevada placed second with a total score of 410 -- nine strokes behind the winning team of Mount Vernon -- and only qualified one girl for state.

Mansfield shot her career low score of 88 to take fifth place, receiving All-District honors and qualifying for the state tournament. "Lakyn had an outstanding round with her fifth place finish," head coach Brian Leonard said.

Emily DeBrine and Mariah Jones both had strong showings in the tournament as well, but missed the state qualfication cutoff by just one stroke. Debrine and Jones tied for the 13th best individual score as they both came in at 105.

Some of the coaches, including Leonard, were somewhat unhappy with the structure of the tournament that resulted in a team with three players posting scores that were behind all of Nevada's individual scores and still taking the overall victory and qualifying for state. "I can do everything in the world, but I can't control the scores," Leonard said.

Another of Nevada's players that Leonard was very impressed with was Jessica Mosbrucker as she also put in her career best score of 112. Mosbrucker is the Lady Tigers' number five golfer and Leonard said he was very pleased to see that type of score from a player in that low position.

The Lady Tigers finished out the day with three of their five golfers taking top 15 individual finishes and thus making the All-District team that consisted of the 15 best individual scores of the day. The Lady Tigers did have a few struggles, however, as Melea Galimberto posted a somewhat disappointing score of 112.

Coming in behind Nevada were the two teams that were expected to fight for the second spot overall at the start of the day. Finishing third with a final score of 415 was Greenwood, followed closely by Carl Junction.

The Lady Tigers showed a very strong performance as a team and despite not getting as many state qualifiers as he had hoped for, Leonard was still very pleased with the day and spoke very highly of his team. "All the girls played fabulous and I was very proud of the girls and their scores for the tournament," he said.

The Class 1 State Championship tournament is scheduled to take place on Oct. 20 and 21, at the Fremont Hills Country Club in Nixa, Mo. Leonard still has high hopes and is anxious for a strong showing for Mansfield in the tournament.