Superior and Northwestern Boys Golf Compete for First Annual Northern Match-Play Cup

Superior went home with the Northland Match-Play cup, scoring 9.5 in overall match play to Northwestern's 2.5. 

LAKE NEBAGAMON, Wis.- Who doesn’t love a little friendly rivalry? That’s exactly what the head golf coaches at Northwestern and Superior had in mind when planning the first annual Northern Match-Play Tournament, the tee’d off Monday afternoon from Botten’s Green Acres.

A 12: 30 PM tee time this afternoon for the Spartans and the Tigers as they’d compete for the first ever Northern Match-Play Cup. The tournament was match-play format, involving every player from each team.

Head coaches Nick Olson and Ed Willie say they wanted to give their golfers a chance to play a competitive round of nine hole without making a long trek with the hopes of making this a recurring tradition. For a little extra incentive, the Northern Match-Play Cup was up for grabs.

“Our first month of the season was all spent indoors in a gym, hitting into nets. That cancelled a lot of our schedule so to be able to come up with this at the end of the season, that everybody gets to participate in at one level ot another is really great for our program. It gives a lot of the younger guys that we’re going to be counting on in the near future some opportunity,” says Willie.

“It’s really cool for them to finally get into a competitive setting because we’re in different conferences, obviously our school’s a little different in size, but we’re so close geographically, it’s finally nice to have these kids get out and play more competitively,” says Olson.

As for the players, they’re excited to be a part of a new tradition with a budding neighboring rivalry.

“It’s really fun, it’s going to be a cool tradition for our school to start. Northwestern and Superior have always had this city, country rivalry so I think it’ll add on to the conflict,” says Tigers junior Lawson Burkhart.

“I think it’s a cool tradition that they’re starting. A great experience to be able to get out and golf, especially against such a close team and not have to travel four hours somewhere. So, it’s nice to be able to have this smaller rivalry between one of our closest rivals,” says Spartans senior Aaron Johnson.

Superior went home with the Northland Match-Play cup, scoring 9.5 in overall match play to Northwestern’s 2.5.