Athletic News

Duchesne Academy's legacy of an outstanding golf team continues as the Cardinals bring home the State Championship win for the 4th year in a row.

Below is an excerpt from an article published by the NSAA recapping the championship tournament. 

Omaha Duchesne did it again. 

After edging Elkhorn North by a single shot at Monument Shadows in Gering for last year’s title, the Cardinals again clipped the Wolves by a shot for another Class B team championship. 

Like last year, Duchesne did it in come from behind fashion as they slowly chipped away at the Wolves seven shot overnight lead. Trailing by three shots to the final nine, the Cardinals pieced together a 24-over par score of 168 on the final nine while EN had a 172. 

“Golf is certainly an individual sport, but I can’t stress enough how valuable it is to have a team,” said Duchesne coach Jeff Nielsen. “Just the fight our whole team had (Monday) and the will of all of those girls to do it for their teammates even if their personal day wasn’t the best.”

Despite trailing after day one, Duchesne’s depth was on full display on Monday as their throw away score was an 89. And, on Tuesday they had counting back nine scores of 40, 42, 43 and 43 with the Wolves going 39, 40, 44 and 49. 

“It was a hard golf course, but a really good golf course,” Nielsen said. “And sometimes it’s easy for somebody to quit and say you know what I am having a bad hole, but we had a group that put that aside and knew that every shot counted. 

“Every single shot.”

Aurora’s Julia Messere was the individual champion after shooting rounds of 82 and 80 to earn medalist honors. Her second day 80 tied for the low round of the day. The Husky, who was fourth in Class C for Grand Island Central Catholic last year, edged Addison Peck of the hometown Bearcats and Gretna East junior Ellie Henn for the title. Henn shared low round honors on Tuesday with Messere. 

It was the fourth straight state title — and eighth since 2015 — for the Cardinals who now have a class record 12 titles in school history. It was also the eighth for Nielsen, in his 19th year at Duchesne.

Seniors Martha Mullen and defending champion Whitney Dahir paced the Cardinals. Mullen finished tied for 7th after a second day 82 (170) and Dahir had matching 86’s to place 11th. Sophomore Lucille McDivitt was 12th. Dahir was on each of the Cardinals past four title teams and Mullen on three.

“Those two have been the glue of our team,” Nielsen said.