Both will be at the Walsh Tournament in North Canton, Ohio, with the men competing there today and the women from Sunday through Tuesday.

Here is a roundup of their action so far since the start of March:

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Women do well in Kentucky

Russel Sprecher

After competing at the Las Vegas Tournament from March 2-6 where no team scores were kept and individual scores weren’t available, the Wildcats women’s team came in fifth among 17 teams at the Saginaw Valley State University Spring Invitational held in Lexington, Kentucky, on March 18-19.

After a slow start of 83 the first day, NMU’s Paxton Johnson sizzled in her second round with 73, tied for the second-lowest score of the day out of 101 golfers.

Her two-round total of 156 tied her for 12th overall as Northern totaled 638, trailing only the 609 posted by champion Findlay, 627 by runner-up Tiffin, 628 by third-place Wayne State and 636 from fourth-place Gannon.

The Wildcats were just ahead of sixth-place Ferris State, which had 645, and seventh-place SVSU at 646.

NMU also finished ahead of Ashland, Walsh, Davenport, Northwood, McKendree, Lewis, Purdue Northwest, Kentucky Wesleyan, Kalamazoo College and Lake Superior State.

Two Northern golfers each totaled 160 to tie for 23rd as Annie Pietila had 78 and 82 and Maya Hunter 79 and 81. Also contributing to the NMU score was Abbie Claire Boozer with 83-79–162, tied for 32nd, while teammate Hailey Bolander had 84-86–170 to tie for 57th.

Two other Wildcats also competed unattached, with Alyssa Yaggie shooting 82-84–166 to tie for 44th and Olivia Brill with 97-99–196 to finish 98th.

At the Findlay Spring Invite, also held in Lexington, Kentucky, right after the SVSU event on March 20-21, Northern was 13th of 18 schools with a three-round total of 981, just behind SVSU’s 979 and just ahead of Davenport’s 982.

A pair of nationally ranked top-10 teams topped the leaderboard as Anderson (South Carolina) won with 888 and Findlay was runner-up with 894.

Tops among current GLIAC schools was Ferris State in sixth with 929 as the Wildcats not only finished ahead of Davenport, but also Northwood, Trevecca Nazarene, Lewis and Purdue Northwest.

Hunter paced the Wildcats, finishing tied for 26th with 77-80-78–235.

Pietila was next for NMU, tying for 61st with 85-83-81–249, while Johnson and Boozer tied for 65th, each with 251 as Johnson had 85-78-88 and Boozer 83-79-89. Boldander was next for Northern, tying for 70th with 85-86-84–255.

Lisa Marie Schumacher of Tiffin won individual honors by four strokes with 73-73-69–215, which was 1-under-par.

Then at the NC4K College Classic hosted by Ohio Dominican in Blacklick, Ohio, on April 3-4, the Wildcats were eighth among a dozen schools with a two-round total of 655, just behind Northwood’s 650 and just ahead of Ashland’s 655.

Indianapolis won the meet with 598 as Tiffin had 607 for runner-up. Next came Ferris State, Ohio Dominican, Gannon, University of Charleston and Northwood in front of NMU, while following Northern were Ashland, Purdue NW, Thomas More and Malone.

With Hunter and Paxton each pacing the Wildcats at their first two meets in March, it only made sense that they share top Northern honors at this meet with 161 each to tie for 25th.

Hunter shot 80 and 81 while Johnson had 86 and 75, Johnson’s second round tied for eighth-best of the day in a field of 82.

Also for NMU, Boozer had 81-85–166 to tie for 40th, Bolander 86-81–167 to tie for 45th and Pietila 93-90–183 to tie for 71st.

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Men get 13th in Ohio

The Northern men also opened their spring season at the Las Vegas Tournament from March 2-6 with no team scores kept and individual scores unavailable.

At the SVSU Spring Invite, where the NMU men joined the women’s team in Lexington, Kentucky, on March 18-19, the Wildcat men placed 17th of 21 schools with a two-round total of 615.

Schools were quite bunched as Northern finished just 32 strokes behind meet champion Davenport’s 583 as McKendree was runner-up with 586.

And sixth-place Wayne State was just 16 strokes ahead of NMU at 599.

With the Wildcats finishing within five strokes of 15th-place Tiffin and 16th-place Walsh, they also finished ahead of Ferris, LSSU, Trevecca Nazarene and Illinois-Springfield.

Pacing NMU was Russel Sprecher, who tied for 20th with rounds of 72 and 76 for 148. His opening even-par round tied for second-best score of the day.

The Wildcats’ Eric Yung was next, tying for 46th with 79-73–152, followed by Walter Ylitalo tied for 98th with 84-76–160, Tyler Annala tied for 102nd with 86-75–161 and Caden Dunn tied for 110th with 80-83–163.

At the Findlay Spring Invite, again held in Lexington, Kentucky, but about a week later on March 27-28, NMU was 20th in the 20-team field with a three-round total of 923, just two strokes behind Walsh’s 921.

Missouri S&T won the meet with 865, while McKendree was runner-up with 867.

Sprecher again paced Northern with 73-76-79–228 to tie for 68th, with Annala next with 79-76-75–230 to tie for 77th.

Scott Spyra was next with 74-83-77–234 to tie for 84th, while Yun had 80-80-76–236 to tie for 90th and Dunn 76-82-82–240 to tie for 96th.

At the Bill Blazer Memorial tourney hosted by Ohio Dominican in Urbana, Ohio, on Saturday and Sunday, the Wildcats finished 13th of 14 teams with a two-round total of 625, a dozen strokes ahead of Shawnee State and just seven strokes behind the next team ahead of them, LSSU.

Wayne State won an extremely close race for the team title with 585 as Davenport and Ferris each were a stroke back at 586. And Indiana, Pennsylvania, was just three back at 588.

Yun paced NMU in this event with 77-78–155 to tie for 51st, with Ylitalo shooting 78-79–157 to tie for 60th, Sprecher 78-81–159 to tie for 67th as Annala had 75-84–159 to also tie for 67th. And teammate Spyra had 84-79–163 to come in 76th.

Dunn competed as an unattached golfer and shot 80-76–156 to tie for 54th.

Interestingly, another unattached golfer had the low individual total as Wright State’s Shane Ochs had 70-70–140. Wright State had just three golfers, one short of fielding a full team.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.