NorthWood’s Mackenzie Weaver chips onto the fifth green Thursday against Northridge and Wawasee. (Photos by Mike Deak)

SYRACUSE – It was a very long and busy Thursday night on the golf course at South Shore, and an equally important one in the grand scheme of things.

The Northern Lakes Conference triangular between NorthWood, Wawasee and Northridge had none of the teams technically listed as the home team, but the actual home team playing on the same course. All the while, as darkness befell the south end of Syracuse, NorthWood was glad to escape with a pair of team wins.

Wawasee’s Tate Cowan shot her best-ever varsity score with a 46.

West Noble, which uses the course as its home pitch, was dueling Fairfield in its already scheduled Northeast Corner Conference matchup. With Maxwelton double booked with a fundraiser at its course, the NLC matchup was shifted to South Shore, but placed on the same front nine as the NECC teams.

With Fairfield and West Noble wrapping up shortly before 7 p.m., the NLC foes still had plenty of work to do as play backed itself up waiting on the NECC contest to snake around the front nine. What came from the logjam was a pair of clutch performances from NorthWood as well as a surprise score from Wawasee that left Northridge on the short end of two losses.

NorthWood’s 182 saw its usually steady ace, Mackenzie Weaver, shoot a 46 including very uncharacteristic triple bogeys on the third and fourth which foiled an otherwise normal round. Coming to the rescue for the Panthers was a pair of 47s from its four and five – Makenna Gall and Abigail Richner – which along with the medalist 44 from Madison Richner and 45 from Abby Slabaugh, gave NorthWood enough breathing room.

“Makenna Gall is playing her first week of conference golf in her life and she shoots a 47 tonight,” stated NorthWood head coach Adam Yoder. “And then we get Abigail to shoot a 47. When you can stay out front of your opponent, and then know those scores are making up for others, that’s key. We were fortunate because our No. 1 (Weaver) and No. 2 (Madison Richner) didn’t play very well tonight considering how they have been playing.”

NorthWood’s Makenna Gall putts on the first green.

What Yoder thought before the match would be a Ridge squad that might unseat NorthWood atop the heap turned into a shocker with its 193 to Wawasee’s 191. Braedyn O’Dell, who has been fantastic for the Raiders in the early going this season, wasn’t her usual self with a 45 which saw double bogeys on five and six then a triple on a straight-forward par-three seventh. Ashley Brewster came in with a 46, then it fell off from there for the Raiders with 51s from Cate Tompkins and Alayna Frey and a 55 from Melissa Weaver.

Wawasee took the chance to play at a relatively familiar course and kept all of its scores at or under 50. The biggest surprise, and possibly the difference between a win and a loss for the Lady Warriors, was the 46 shot by No. 5 Tate Cowan, who has bounced back and forth between varsity and JV ranks this season. A 47 from Jadison Rostochak and two 49s from Lesley Tayagua and Zoe White were enough to get a split, not needing the 50 from its No. 1 Belle Brunner.

“We had four scores in the 40s and that will keep you in it most nights,” said Wawasee head coach Steve Coverstone. “When Bella is shooting a 50, and that’s the worst score, that just says the other girls are stepping up. Bella won’t have many nights like tonight, and boy did she gut it out tonight. It was a “good 50” considering she had to make some good shots to get there. It really wasn’t that bad of a score if you take out a couple bad holes.”

NorthWood now sits in the NLC driver’s seat heading into the final week of the conference season tied with Warsaw at 3-0. The Tigers beat Plymouth by 31 strokes Thursday, setting up a huge matchup Tuesday at Maplecrest with host Goshen. Warsaw finishes next week hosting Concord and Northridge before the focus swings to the NLC tournament on Sept. 9 at Pretty Lake in Plymouth.

“The reality is the regular season is pretty important because it’s much better to have at least half the title going into the conference tournament,” Yoder said. “We’re still looking to defend our title and that means playing well on nights like tonight where it wasn’t ideal. To get the rounds out of our three-four-five like we did was huge for us going forward.”

Added Coverstone, “These girls are smart. They’ve figured out these conference matches are important. With such a young team, we want to give a lot of kids a chance to play some varsity and build a base. The more competition, the better they are. That’s been our strategy, and tonight with Tate in that fifth position, she really came through for us.”

Wawasee’s Zoe White watches her drive travel the second fairway.