A Look At Kimball Girls Golf Over The Years

As I was writing stories on the Kimball High girls golf team qualifying for the State Tournament this past week, I was curious as to just how many Kimball High girls teams had experienced this honor.

I knew for sure that the Hager sisters were involved with state tournament play so I called on their dad Rollie, thinking that would save me a lot of time going back through old files etc., and it certainly did save me time as Rollie, with a lot more technical savvy than this old scribe has, brought me two pages of past Kimball High girls golf history. You readers can thank Rollie for the info I am going to share with you.

Let us begin in 1998 when the team of Darci Haug, Loni Janicek, Katie Culek, Becky Yost and Anna Diemoz shot 925 and finished 1st at the Class C state event. 

The next year in 1999 this same team, with the exception of Hannah Abplanalp replacing Diemoz, shot 840 to finish 7th and Janicek finished 4th with her rounds of 92-89=181.

The 2000 team made it again with Jessica Brawner replacing Haug and shot 880 for 10th with Katie Culek (Schnell), now Kimball's coach, shooting the low rounds of 98-100=198 for 26th place and Loni Janicek having the misfortune of being disqualified for being out of place on a tee box even though she was farther back, rather than forward!

The 2001 team still had Culek, Brawner and Abplanalp along with Emily Grant and Hillary Griffith, and they shot a team score of 830 to to finish 11th with Culek breaking into the top 15 with her round of 94-93=187 to tie for 13th.

Then Kimball had a dry spell until 2007 when Tori Hager, Elizabeth Bohac, Kaitlin Wilson, and Katie Watson (Haun) shot 802 for an 8th place finish with Hager (Evertson) low with her round of 98-100=198 to tie for 27th.

Next on the list was the 2010 team of Tori Hager (Evertson), Brooke Hager, Emily Merryfield, Kelby Dickerson (Hinton) and Tessa Shaw shooting 929 for 15th with Tori Hager low with 108-115=223. 

The 2013 team of Brooke Hager, Hannah Walker, Brianna Jones, Jaycie Walker, and Kallie Bush was limited to just a one day performance due to bad weather and Bush withdrew due to illness. The team shot 446 for 11th place and Brooke Hager was low with her round of 98, which tied her for 16th and just one place out of the top 15. Needless to say, it was a cold and wet event with water in the fairways and bunkers.

No team qualifying for a while, but Jaycie Walker qualified as an individual in 2014 and tied for 61st.

No one until 2018, when Payton Wise qualified as the lone individual as a freshman and in another one day 18 hole event, shot 94 for the 12th place medal. She went back in 2019 along with sophomore teammate Katie Heeg and improved to a 3rd place finish for her second medalist performance shooting 78-85=163. That brings us up to this year, when we once again qualified as a team as we have been reporting with Wise getting her 3rd straight state metal.

At this time, Kimball High has had three golfers who have been four time state qualifiers in Katie Culek (Schnell), Tori Hager (Evertson), and Brooke Hager. 

File this report for future reference and thank you, Rollie, for looking up this info for me.