Six area girls' teams set for Georgia state golf

The Dalton High School girls' golf team already qualified for the Georgia Class AAAA state tournament to be held May 20 at the nearby Nob North course.

Heritage, Northwest Whitfield and Southeast Whitfield will be there with the Lady Catamounts by virtue of their finishes Monday in a GHSA sectional at Blueberry Plantation, which is about 20 minutes south of Augusta.

"It's most definitely worth the trip," Northwest girls' coach John Linder said. "We knew there were 13 teams for 11 spots, and we felt pretty confident going in. We felt this was a time to sharpen things. We advanced and yet we found out that we have work to do."

His Lady Bruins shot a three-player score of 302 with Dallas Coker and Alicia Cole each shooting 100.

Southeast advanced with senior Megan Collins leading the way with a 7-over-par 79.

"At the beginning of the year, we were thinking we couldn't reach state," Southeast coach Todd Murray said. "Then as it got closer to region, we were on the bubble. And we took six strokes off our score today from what we shot at regionals. Playing at state is a big positive for our program and our school."

Heritage will be joining the three schools from within Whitfield County at the public course just north of Dalton. The Ringgold-based Lady Generals shot a 278 with senior Rachel Rebne shooting a 77 and earning unofficial medalist honors. Only Carrollton's 251 beat the Lady Generals.

"Our goal was to make state, and that's done," Heritage coach Kevin Terry said. "Anything else is icing on the cake. Our three seniors are going to go out in style."

All four area Class AAAA girls' teams that qualified have plans to play as much golf at Nob North as possible in the next 13 days.

"We're going to wear that course out as much as we can," Linder said. "We'd like to get about five full 18-hole rounds in and shore up our short game on the days in between."

The Trion and Gordon Lee girls qualified Monday for the Class A state tournament. Trion won the sectional with two girls counting a total of 195, and Gordon Lee was runner-up with a 196. The Trion boys' team finished fifth and six shots out of qualifying for the state.

"We'll go to state with Gordon Lee and battle them again," Trion coach Doug Wilson said.

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