Golf Saskatchewan announced earlier this month that the local 18-hole valley layout will host the 95th Junior Boy’s and 71st Junior Girl’s provincial tournaments from Tuesday, July 13 through Thursday, July 15.
Seeing the best young players in the province patrolling the local links will be a welcome sight for Hillcrest manager Jasmine Cameron, especially in light of a current boom in junior memberships at the course.
“We wanted to focus on the junior piece of it because our new program has just done so well the least three years,” Cameron said. “We average around 60 kids, so we understand that in the game of golf they’re the future of our courses, so why not introduce to them a championship they can be in and maybe continue on later in life?”
And there’s precedent for success in the event, too -- especially when it’s at the local course.
Leighton Bearchell carded a three-round total of 212 to win the 2013 junior boys title when the tournament was last held at the Hillcrest, winning in a playoff over fellow Moose Jaw competitor Mike Flegel.
Interestingly enough, the junior girls champion from that same week was Prince Albert’s Brooke Hobson, who is now the captain of the NCAA Northeastern University women’s hockey team and a Team Canada prospect.
Saskatoon’s Josh Nagy is the defending champion on the boys side, having shot three-under to take an eight-stroke win in Swift Current in his final year of eligibility for the 18-and-under competition. Defending girls champion Brooklin Fry of Shell Lake won her title by 10 shots and at 17 is eligible to take another run at the championship.
As one might expect, every effort will be made to get the Hillcrest in as good of shape as possible for the third week in July in order to give the players the best possible conditions to show of their skills.
“It’s not a ton of work over and above what we usually do, we'll maintain a schedule sort of based on what a championship would look like so everything is laid out as we would need,” said Cameron. “We do have the officials that come down a week prior, too, and make sure all of our stakes are in the right spots, just things like the bunkers if they need additional sand. It’s minimal, but it’s all things we should be doing anyway, it’ll just improve our course in general.”
One minor area of concern is the ongoing Diefenbaker Lake pipeline project running adjacent to the course. It’s hoped that work will be largely completed by the time the provincial groups tee off.
“It’s an eyesore right now, but hopefully once spring hits we’ll be able to work with the contractors and the city to restore it back to what we can,” Cameron said. “We know it’s not going to happen overnight, they did what they could to do the job with minimal disruption and hopefully everything will be okay by the time provincials are here.”
