By Garth Shanklin
Sports Editor

The 2016 golf campaign may not have gotten off to the best start imaginable for the Clermont Northeastern Rockets, but both the boys’ and girls’ teams have turned it around of late.

On Aug. 5, the boys’ team started the regular season by hosting Amelia, Madeira and Western Brown for match play, which the Rockets won.

The team then moved to the Madeira Invitational, where they shot a 425 as a team and finished ninth out of 10 teams. Head coach Brandon Hoeppner highlighted the team’s youth when discussing their start to the season.

“The boys are starting off pretty decent, maybe struggling a little bit,” Hoeppner said. “We have some fairly young golfers.”

At the Rocket Shootout on Aug. 9, CNE shaved 25 strokes of their score, finishing sixth overall. The team continued that success into their next several contests, as after a loss to Walnut Hills the squad has since defeated Roger Bacon by 12 strokes, Glen Este by four, Blanchester by 20 and Madeira by 15.

Several players are having solid season for the Rockets. Noah Hoeppner has earned medalist honors three times, including once in a junior varsity contest. Jake Cruey earned three such honors in a span of three matches earlier this month for the Rockets. He has seen his average drop from a 62 in 2014 to a 47 this season. All of the Rockets on the roster have seen their scores improve from one season to the net. Chris Moorhouse averaged a 59.04 in 2014 and has since cut it down to a 48 in 2016.

That type of improvement bodes well for players in their first year on the team, such as Foster Kuntz and Clayton Williams. Hoeppner said he believes those two will develop into solid players for the Rockets.

“For the boys, we have two freshman that came in Kuntz and Williams, both of whom I believe are going to be eventual leaders of this team,” Hoeppner said. “The sophomores have been picking it up as well, we’re pretty much led by junior Chris Moorhouse. He’s probably going to be the player of the year for us.”

Another new addition to the Rockets squad comes to the links via the gridiron. Shawn Lykins played on the CNE football team last year, but this season he’s bringing solid leadership and attitude to golf.
“His positive attitude is helping everyone on the team,” Hoeppner said. “Making the switch from football to golf hasn’t been easy for him, but he’s picking it up well.”

Hoeppner said the boys’ team has a simple goal this season: win the Southern Buckeye Academic and Athletic Conference National Division title.

“Our goal for the boys team is to win the SBAAC National division,” Hoeppner said. “I think we have a good possibility of doing it. We’re going to try out best.”

Much like the boys’ team, the girls’ golf team at CNE is young, according to Hoeppner.

“It’s a fairly young team,” Hoeppner said. “We have three juniors leading the way with a sophomore and freshman in the final spot.”

That freshman would be Taylor Shumard, who played on the CNE junior high golf team in eighth grade. Hoeppner said she has immediately made an impact at the varsity level.

“She came in and shot a 44 at Little Miami, and she broke 100 her first invitational,” Hoeppner said. “She’s adding a lot to the school. We actually broke 200 for the first time since adding a girls’ team.”

The girls haven’t had as many matches as the boys’ team has, though like the boys’ team they participated in the Rocket Shootout on Aug. 9. They finished third, three strokes behind Clinton Massie. Shumard shot a 97, one stroke behind Skylar Shircliff.

The girls’ golf team went on a run midway through August. They defeated McNicholas by 13 strokes,

Anderson by seven and they defeated New Richmond in the Lady Lions’ first-ever girls’ golf match. The victories have evened the team’s record so far this season at 6-6, and Hoeppner said they too would like to post a solid finish in the conference.

“For the girls, we’re starting up a league or conference with Little Miami, Summit Country Day, Georgetown, Cincinnati Country Day and Cincinnati Hills Christian Academy for all these Division II teams that don’t have a conference to play in,” Hoeppner said. “The SBAAC doesn’t recognize girls golf, so we kind of have our own conference. Our goal there is to finish in the top three of the six teams that are competing in that.”

The Rockets’ boys team will be in action on Sept. 6 at the first round of the SBAAC tournament, held at Cedar Trace Golf Club at 4 p.m. The girls’ team will participate in the Lima Central Catholic Invitational on Sept. 3 beginning at 9:30 a.m. They will also host the first round of the Cincinnati Girls’ Golf Conference tournament at Cedar Trace on Sept. 7 at 4 p.m.