February 25, 2020
With his first semester as head coach of the women’s golf team behind him, Todd Laxson is preparing the women’s golf team for their spring season.
“We lost our head coach,” said Laxson. “We lost one senior last year [and] we lost two girls that did not return to the team for personal reasons, so we really changed the entire dynamic of the team with a new head coach even though I’ve been part of the team for the last three years.”
The previous head coach, Sadie Farnsworth, tendered her resignation in June to be closer to her family. Laxson said that there was not really a recruiting class that came in this season because of the uncertainty regarding who was going to be the head coach this the season.
The team has two freshman this season: Julia Eaton and Mackenzie Fontana.
“Having two freshmen was better than no freshmen, but certainly we could have had probably two more players,” said Laxson.
Eaton and Fontana along with Julia Baroth, Regina Dillon, Dakotah Kreil and Brianna Vetter make up the six-woman squad.
“Having six players was really helpful for me because it allowed me to kind of keep everybody together,” said Laxson. “Our freshmen came in and didn’t act like freshmen really as far as their social skills and their cultural kind of skills for the team are concerned so everybody got along very nicely in the fall which is great because we’re around each other a lot for practice and travel.”
Laxson wants to bring in three to four freshmen in the next recruiting class along with a transfer athlete.
“We will have a nice solid culture built to receive those new players into and this past fall we were just busy building our culture.”
The fall season was a mixed bag for the women’s golf team as they started well at the CSU-Pueblo Farmers Insurance Samual Proal Invite to begin the season but faltered as the season progressed, finishing No. 16 out of 17 in their final tournament of the fall season.
“I think all of them need a little confidence,” said Laxson. “At the end of the fall, we played in the regional preview in California and I think everyone was pretty much glad the golf season was over. We had kind of limped into the finish a little bit in the fall, so I think we need to restore some confidence.” Laxson said the first event of the spring, St. Mary’s Invitational in San Antonio, will be a great test for the team because three or four top-25 schools will be there.
“We’re developing better practice habits and I’m hoping that turns into some better competition on the golf course especially in practice because that’s what we’re wanting to happen,” said Laxson. “[We want] the tournaments to be kind of a bonus and the reward as opposed to the tournaments you’re going to because ‘well, you have to.’”
Laxson wants to see continuing good scores from his No. 4 and 5 golfers, explaining that the team has ended up in the middle of the pack most of the time score-wise because they haven’t seen scores from their No. 4 and 5 golfers that put them past other teams.
“If we can get four scores in the 70s, we will do very well at every event this spring and that will build us up very nicely at RMAC.”
Women’s golf spring season begins on Monday, March 2 for at the two-day St. Mary’s Invitational.