Developing Malden golf program hosts first match of the season

MALDEN – As the Malden golf team takes the course this year with six players with little to no experience, the program is depending on the progress of three players a year into their own journey to pick up some wins.

“We're looking to the future,” second-year Malden golf coach Zane Huckeby said. “We're building the program, so I'm looking at the next two or three years. When the kids I had as freshmen last year are seniors, it might be a different story. We're looking forward to the future, but we're doing what we can now.

“We'd like to throw on some wins – that would be good for us – and I think we've got a chance with a fair few teams,” he continued. “Especially if the kids keep working hard like they are now. Some teams that pounded us last year won't be pounding us as hard this year.”

The Green Wave opened their season Thursday with a home match against Poplar Bluff – whose roster is loaded with much more experience.

Huckeby, a 2009 Malden graduate himself, has big plans for the team. And while it may seem to be a distant aspiration, he's already seeing the fruits of the teams' labor.

“The half that I had last year, most of them had not hit a golf ball before last March,” he said. “With that, I look at them and like (Ellen Stover), she hadn't hit a golf ball before March of this year so her being able to hit the ball 100 yards is impressive.

“I keep their scorecards from early in the season and compare them to those at the end,” he explained. “The kids I had last year, they've improved their scores by 20 strokes over 18 holes. They couldn't hit the ball half the time at the beginning of the season, and by the end they were consistent.”

Huckeby taught four of the five golfers present at Thursday's match how to play from the ground up. Of the six total: Ellen Stover, Julian McGowan, Colton Rhine, Olivia Casto, Benjamin Jones and Ian Pickard, Pickard has the most experience of any of the team – and his only extends “three or four years.”

Malden�s Ian Pickard surveys his shot during the Green Wave�s home match against Poplar Bluff Thursday, March 30, 2023. Christian Johnson, Delta Dunklin Democrat

“We've got some good kids who don't get frustrated, but I can see it on their faces,” Huckeby said. “It's like 'Man, when I'm playing good competition I should be better.' You can't really compare yourselves to kids who have been playing for a long time.

“You have to play against good people to see that you're not the only person who can play golf,” he continued. “I like to schedule Poplar Bluff early, because it lets them realize that there are some kids who really know how to play the game other than just old people.”

Huckeby's struggle in building a program is multifaceted – golf is just simply not as popular a sport with younger kids as others, it's often viewed as less approachable and there aren't as many resources for outsiders of a country club to get started – but he wants to change that.

“It's an uphill battle for small schools in small areas and poor areas because golf is still viewed as a rich man's sport, but it's not,” he said. “We offer at the country club a good opportunity for memberships for kids who want to play. We're trying to build this program, but it's not going to happen overnight. They work with us well. They see the importance of getting kids interested in the sport. They're investing in the future of this city, really. ”

He plans to start camps for younger children in the summertime, and to plant the seed of golf early on to teach fundamentals before they reach high school.

While he's confident that the Green Wave will “be more competitive” this year and as the years go on, he hopes to instill more than just knowledge of the sport in his team.

“A lot of kids these days don't face much adversity,” Huckeby said. “Golf is all about adversity and how you overcome it. If you have one bad hole and you get in your head about it, your whole round is gone.”

The team hosts Bloomfield and Doniphan at the Malden Tri Match next Tuesday, April 4.

“Ideally, when a team looks at Malden on their schedule, they'll say 'we've got to watch out for them,'” he said. “That's what I want to build.”