The Spring Valley Cardinals played in the Dunn-St. Croix Conference championship at Glen Hills Golf Course on Monday, taking fourth as a team.

It was the end of the conference season for the Cardinals, and although they finished near the bottom in team scores, they played competitively.

Sam Steinmeyer and Mara Ducklow led the way for Spring Valley, shooting as the #1 and #2 and finishing with identical scores of 95, good for a top 12 finish on the day for both.

Tyler Paulson continued his strong play, finishing third on the team and 18^th overall with a 107 while hitting out of the #5 spot. Max Wittmer’s 120 and Chase Glaus’ 128 rounded out the scoring for the red birds on the day.

The Cardinals have consistently taken fourth in every meet, something that Head Coach Tyler Anderson had said was likely to happen ahead of the season. However, although the finishes have been the same, he says he thinks the team has made steady growth all season.

“We kind of finished where we expected to, but the nice thing was, we did improve with almost every match. That's all you can ask for is improvement,” Anderson said. “We’re still a ways away from finishing at the top of the Dunn-St. Croix, but we’ve had some kids that have placed well in the conference.”

Ducklow is one of those that has played well and improved consistently for the Cardinals. She finished sixth out of 25 golfers in a conference meet last week. She also shot the best round of her life in a tournament recently, so she says she’s ready for regionals.

“I feel like I got better this year. I set my personal record and shot an 89 the other day. I’ve never broken 90 before, so I think I'm finishing off strong,” Ducklow said. “We've got a very tough conference. Even if I don’t advance, I just try to focus on my own game and really to just better myself.”

Coming up next for Spring Valley is the regional round of postseason play which will be at Pheasant Hills Golf Course at 9 a.m. May 22.

Prescott

The Prescott Cardinals played their final conference meet of the season at Pheasant Hills Golf Course on Monday, finishing in a third place tie out of eight teams.

It was a tough day at the office for the golfers at Pheasant Hills as the wind and some hole placement on several greens made for some difficult holes and higher scores than players would’ve liked.

Prescott’s #1 golfer Tyler Reiter is typically pretty close to a scratch golfer, shooting right around par in most of his rounds, and even though he finished in first place, he was still +7 on the day. Reiter only had one birdie, but he limited the damage overall and played his way into a tie at the top of the field.

Sam Vesperman, Luke Kinneman and Harris Linderholm played in the #2, #3 and #4 spots, and they all finished within one stroke of each other at 93, 91 and 92 respectively. Miles Malm rounded out the scoring for the Cardinals, shooting an even 100.

With the conference portion of their year at an end, next up for Prescott’s golfers is the regional round of postseason play when they travel back to Pheasant Hills on at 9 a.m. May 22.

Ellsworth

The Ellsworth Panthers finished sixth in their final Middle Border Conference meet of the season on Monday at Pheasant Hills Golf Course, out of eight teams.

The scores were higher than usual on Monday with the wind playing a factor in the more open layout of Pheasant Hills, as well as some atypically challenging hole placements which made some greens all but unparable.

The fact that Panthers’ #1 shooter Trey Wittenberg took first place in a three-way tie at +7 on the day is indicative of the day the players had on the links.

Wittenberg started the round hot, playing to -2 after four holes with a pair of birdies, but three double bogeys towards the end of the front nine mitigated those gains. His back nine was similar, two birdies and a handful of extra strokes to balance them out. The final of these birdies was on hole 18 and secured his spot at the top on the day.

Panthers’ #3 shooter Cooper Olson also played a good round, finishing with an 85 and tied for 11^th out of the 40 golfers present. Rowan Nelson finished with a 104, Thomas Tober with a 105 and Logan Peterson rounded out the scoring for Ellsworth with a 106.

With the conference season at an end, the Panthers will look forward to returning to Pheasant Hills next Wednesday for the regional portion of postseason competition. That round of play begins at 9 a.m. May 22.

River Falls

The River Falls Wildcats played three rounds of golf this week, taking first place at the Eastwood Invitational while facing 10 Class AAA opponents from Minnesota. They placed fifth at the Rice Lake Invitational on Thursday and then took first place on Monday at home in a Big Rivers Conference meet.

It was a busy but productive week for the Wildcats who garnered a pair of top placing performances.

First, they shot a team score of 300 and won the Eastwood Invitational by five strokes. The next three teams after them in the rankings were Northfield, Albert Lea and Rochester Century, who all shot a 305. Ryan Swanson won the individual portion with a score of 71, Will Benedict’s 74 got him a tie for fourth place and Archimedes Xiong’s 76 earned him part of a four-way tie for seventh place.

Thursday’s meet in Rice Lake wasn’t quite as good for River Falls. Benedict led the team with a 72, taking third, and Swanson shot a 75 earning him a tie for 11^th.

The Wildcats finally returned home to play River Falls Golf Course on Monday, which was a much better outing for them. Benedict led the way again from the #2 spot, shooting a 35 and winning the individual portion of the meet, and Connor OMalley also had a good day, shooting a 38. Swanson and #5 shooter Daniel Linn each finished with a 40, and Xiong finished with a 41.

Coming up this week for the Wildcats is a BRC round at Mill Run Golf Course on Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. followed by the Big Rivers Conference Tournament on Thursday at Whitetail Golf Course at 9 a.m.