Sports preview: Boys golf swings for an improved season

Senior talent to play a pivotal role

The Forest Lake boys golf team looks to improve upon its finishes from a season ago, where the Rangers ultimately placed eighth overall in the Suburban East Conference, while earning the same result in Section 7AA play. Led by head coach Matthew Schugel, the squad possesses a number of key returnees for this year’s spring season.

A young, but talented freshman sniper in Dayne Dierson looks to start off his high school career in strong fashion, while a senior pair in Mason Bromert and Gavin Traylor look to continue their reign and step up as leaders for the underclassmen. Having four seniors total, the duo will look to avenge losing other two seniors a season ago and seemingly replace their roles.

Schugel notes that this year’s expectations for the boys are nothing short of improving upon last year’s results.

“Basically, to finish higher than we did last year,” Schugel states. “We’re a similar constructed team overall from last year to this season, so – if we can perform better than last year as a whole – that’d be our main goal.”

Schugel also mentions how crucial it is for the team to remain as consistent as possible throughout the campaign, and details the key to making it all happen.

“We just have to be more consistent–we had some good runs last year where we were able to put something together, but we have almost this big gap in our conference between the top seven and the bottom three teams. So we went on some runs where we snuck into that gap, but we had other ones where we lost by about 20 shots or so, so just trying to be more consistent in the sense of where we finish and how we place,” Schugel said.

“We can do that by just avoiding the big numbers – you’re going to make bogey’s, they’re going to make pars – it’s avoiding the doubles and triples and quads.”

The boys aim to kick off their 2024 season with aspirations of making notable jumps in improvement, as their first opportunity to hit the greens is scheduled for Monday, April 8, at Troy Burne Golf Course at 9 a.m.