Nine Trips to State as Individuals, None as a Team. Then Came Monday at Pine Creek.
Lebanon High School has sent golfers to the state tournament nine times. Every one of those trips was a solo act: one player, one bag, one hotel room in East Tennessee. On Monday, Sept. 21, at Mt. Juliet's Pine Creek, the Blue Devils finally earned the right to make the drive together.
Lebanon won the Region 4-AA boys championship to qualify for the TSSAA state tournament as a team for the first time in program history. They will tee it up Oct. 8 and 9 at Sevierville Golf Club.
A 69 to lead the way
Leadership came from the top of the card. Bryson Frederick was the region's low medalist with a 69, a round that would turn heads on any course, let alone in a postseason event with a state berth on the line. Colin Mitchell backed him up with a 73 to finish third overall. Turner Davis and Connor Kegley each posted 76, and Jack Anderson carded a 77, giving Lebanon the depth that separates a good individual from a good team.
That depth had already shown up a week earlier, when the Blue Devils took the District 7-AA title, also at Pine Creek, finishing ahead of Cookeville. Winning the district and the region back to back on the same course made it clear this was no fluke.
Built on work
Head coach Derek Southworth has described this group as the hardest-working team he has had, the kind of players whose days revolve around the game from morning to night. It is the sort of praise coaches hand out often. Two titles in two weeks suggest this group earned it.
High school golf rarely draws crowds. There are no bleachers or student sections, just parents trailing along the cart path and players grinding over three-foot putts in the late-September heat. That is part of what makes a first-ever team berth special. It usually comes from years of range sessions and qualifying rounds that almost nobody sees.
Another Wilson County golfer heads east
Lebanon will not be the only Wilson County name in Sevierville. Wilson Central's London Lomas qualified for the girls state tournament as an individual with an 84 at the region.
Pine Creek has been a good course for county golf this fall. In August, Mt. Juliet's girls won the Wilson County Cup by two strokes on the same layout. Now Lebanon's boys have given the county another reason to watch the state leaderboard in October.
Good luck to the Blue Devils and to Lomas. And for more fall plans close to home, see our Fall and Halloween family guide.
