Brighton golfers look to retain Lakes preseason title

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BRIGHTON — The Brighton girls golf team shot a 337 in finishing third at its own invitational on Monday.

A respectable score, to be sure, but more impressive when you consider the Bulldogs were without two of their top golfers.

Julia Dean, the reigning Miss Golf, has been unavailable for the high school season so far due to a non-sports-related injury, and Autumn Blaney, a sophomore who rocketed her way into the mix last year in her first year of golf, is out with a shoulder injury.

“If you’d asked me 2-3 years ago if we’d shoot a 337, I would ha ve been great with any one of my full teams,” Brighton coach Paul Parsell said. “So to do that with a couple people not at 100 percent and two players down, that’s a great score for us. We know that when those girls come back, we should put some low numbers up.”

Brighton co-captain Heather Fortushniak is confident in her team's prospects going into Wednesday's Lakes Conference preseason meet. (Photo by Tim Robinson)
Brighton co-captain Heather Fortushniak is confident in her team’s prospects going into Wednesday’s Lakes Conference preseason meet. (Photo by Tim Robinson)

In the meantime, the Bulldogs will look to defend their Lakes Conference preseason title today at Hartland Glen Golf Course. The final standings are determined by how a team finishes in the preseason tournament, in dual matches and in the postseason tournament.

Brighton lost only one player, Allie Erkkila, to graduation, and despite the injury problems plaguing the team, junior co-captain Heather Fortushniak says the Bulldogs’ depth is a key to their early success.

“We have a lot of competition on the team,” she said. “Our 4, 5 and 6 golfers are very close in score, too.”

That helps cut the difference in scores between Brighton’s top three golfers, including Dean, Fortushniak and Annie Pietila, and a second group that includes Blaney, Emme Darkowski and Sophie Lowe.

And, even with two of those top six out, Parsell is going with a best-available golfer train of thought.

“We’ve got a lot of pretty good players,” he said.

The Hartland Glen course is familiar to today’s players. It’s where both Lakes Conference tournaments were played last year.

Fortushniak, for her part, is upbeat.

“I just want everyone to go out there and shoot their best with what they have to bring that day,” she said. “We have to work on our mental game and I think if we stay in it mentally and be confident in every shot, we should be pretty good.”

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