Girls have each other’s back

The Washington High School girls golf team has had an extended run of success.

Success can be defined in many ways and as long as an individual does their best, Demons coach Len Kull considers that successful in its own right.

'I like to talk about the girls doing their best, whatever that may be,” Kull said. 'What I tried to do is emphasize the team a lot. Everybody has their own position and everybody has the back of their teammate. That way it takes the pressure off of everybody.”

With no Nacos on the team this year - Anna is attending Dubuque Wahlert while Sarah has graduated and attends Bradley University - Kull will rely on four returners, three who scored on last year's state championship team.

'We are going to put our foot on the gas and keep going,” Kull said. 'We have four that have played and have a lot of experience and have experienced success. We have three that are new and are listening and paying attention and are eager to learn. We are a ways from where we want to be. We are not going to be where we want to be playing competitively for three or four weeks. It is going to be an uphill push. We absolutely have a lot of potential.”

Sophomore Kiki Guo, sophomore Josie Tanner, junior Emily Waite and senior Carly Burlingame have all been part of a state tournament champion team.

There are three new girls with junior Madison Fishback, junior Macy Driscoll and sophomore Emma Nichols.

'I don't worry about individual scores because it just creates pressure,” Kull said. 'We are going to play as hard as we can for as long as we can.”

Golf is an individual sport but individuals feed off one another's success and rely on each other.

'I think a large part of our success, not just last year, but the whole time I've been coaching, has been our focus on the team,” Kull said.

Kull has never stressed winning. He just tells his players to do the best they can. If it is good enough, then it is good enough. If it isn't, then that's where the coaching takes place. They will work on something and try to get better.

'When the girls asked me what I expect them to shoot, I tell them ‘your best.' It is going to be good sometimes. It is going to be average sometimes. Maybe, once in a while, not good at all. That's just the nature of this sport.”

The beginning of a season is always an unknown, even if the team is the reigning state champions.

'I don't know how this season will go,” Kull said. 'We have two that were the support people last year that are going to be part of the main people this year. They will give their best shot and that's all I ask. As long as they work at it, the results will come from that.”

A weakness would be the experience of this year‘s team.

'There is just not very much room for error,” Kull said. 'We are going to have some good scores but finding the ones that fill out the team score will be a process. We are going to get them up to speed as fast as we can, but then you just have to have a natural process. One year you do good and the next year you do better and you just improve every year.”

The month of April is for duals and triangulars and quadrangulars, which are the meets Kull will use to get the foundation. May brings tournaments.

'We have a real ambitious schedule of tournaments that will tell us how much we have progressed,” Kull said. 'We are going to have ups and downs this year. There are times when they are going to be sad. There are times when they are going to be happy. I have no way of gauging other teams, but I know my team and we will give it our best shot.”