By Coach Jack Rice

On Thursday, April 3, the Friday Harbor Wolverines traveled to Blaine to play the Lummi Nation at the famous Loomis Trails Golf Club. Loomis Trail has a reputation as one of the toughest golf courses in the state, with water on 17 of the 18 holes.

The local squad traveled with only four players as most of the team either made an early exit for spring break, were injured, sick or needed to catch up on school work. Our two underclassmen, Randy Rebhan and Oliver Grifo, took on two freshmen from the Lummi school. All four players struggled with the difficult course and scored in the low 60s.

Friday Harbor’s A-squad players, Finn Graham and Fisher Goosman, were matched up with the top players from the Lummi Nations. Noah Balllew and Ray Bob used their local knowledge to shoot 42 and 45 and outpace the Friday Harbor squad by a number of shots. As Loomis Trails is scheduled to be the site of this year’s District Tournament, which is the first step on the journey to the State Tournament, it was beneficial to get a practice round under our belt. With extra time on our ferry schedule, the A squad made the turn at nine holes and continued onto the back nine. I was able to catch up with them on number 11 where Graham notified me that he was one under on the back nine and didn’t want to quit. This was the first time this year Graham was in the red for any game, and he wanted to keep it going to see how far he could carry the round. Graham was able to get in a couple more holes and maintained his good play before we were forced to make a run for the ferry.

To give you an example of how difficult Loomis Trails Golf Club actually plays, I remember a few years ago I took an eighth-grader with us to play the match. He teed off early, and when I finally caught up with him on the sixth hole, he was just walking along, carrying his bag. We have a rule: “You never give up because you might just birdie the next hole and bounce right back.” I said, “What’s up Pal, how come you’re not playing?” The young man looked at me and said, “I lost ALL my golf balls.” The second hole at Loomis is a par five with water almost all the way to the green. He told me that every time he hit the ball, all he could see was another fish jumping in the pond. According to the rules of golf, once you run out of balls, you’re disqualified from play. I congratulated him on following the USGA rules of golf and gave him a free pass for the day.