The Lady Tigers won their first golf tournament of the year and Katie Hamilton led the way with a record-setting performance at the Willard Invitational. Hamilton shot a best-ever 74 to break Payton Rayl’s single-round school record by one stroke.
Republic’s team score of 356 was a whopping 28 strokes ahead of the nearest competitor, Nixa, which shot a 384.
Hamilton won the individual title by five strokes over Wriley Heibert of Glendale. Alexus Mitchell’s 91 was good enough for 6th. Rylea Smith tied for 7th at 94. Holly Casagrand finished with a 97 and Madison Beckham shot a 99. Ashley White shot a 103 and Madisyn Klossing a 96.
“The weird thing is, I don’t feel like I’m playing my best,” says Hamilton, who missed tying the school record by one stroke with a 76 on Tuesday. “I do feel, though, like my attitude is really good, and I know that I am capable of anything, so no matter what happens, I never give up.”
Coach Curt Plotner says he was happy to be able to witness Hamilton’s big day.
“It was an amazing round of golf, and I was glad that I got to see most of it. I spent a little more time with her than usual today because she had gotten off to a really good start, and I could just tell that it was going to be a special day,” he says.
Plotner says everyone on the team played well and avoided big mistakes, just three days after putting together a solid effort at the Pearson Invitational and finishing four strokes of the lead.
“A lot of things went right today. I thought when we played our best golf at the same time that we were capable of something like this,” Plotner says. “The girls have really wanted to win a tournament this year, and I thought we played well enough Monday to make that happen, but that is golf sometimes.
“Today, we didn’t seem to have as many bad holes. For the most part, the girls have had 14-15 good holes each tournament and 3-4 really bad ones that have pushed their score higher than usual. We avoided that today, and mixed in some really good holes.”