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Mar. 31OSKALOOSA Fresh off a trip to state last season, the Oskaloosa boys golf team will have to replace their top two guys from that squad while returning the rest of their varsity lineup and welcoming a big group vying for some playing time.

"We have 31 guys out so numbers is a big strength," Oskaloosa head coach Bret Foster said. "We also have four guys returning that played at the state tournament last year and a bunch of guys that are competitive and ready to take on some bigger roles. This is the first year in a while that I am not sure who will be on varsity, so I'm not sure if that's good or bad."

Oskaloosa will return the likes of Keaton Flaherty (91.5 18-hole average), Tucker DeJong (89.5), Johnathon Terpstra (88.1), Ryan Carriker (97.1) and Caleb Cohrt (108) to the squad. All five will have a chance to step back into a varsity role this spring and improve upon their games.

Joining them is a big group of newcomers vying to get into the mix. Some of those that could shoot for varsity rounds include Carter Blanco, Meer Patel, Nik Smith, Skylar Jarvis, Garrett Roethler, Nolan Scott, Jaden DeRonde and Maddux Ashman.

The Indians are coming off a conference title which they claimed by a mere four strokes in a meet that saw the top six teams separated by six strokes. Oskaloosa would then go on to take third at sectionals and second at districts to qualify as a team for state.

Four of six that played at state return for the Indians, who ended up taking ninth as a team. The Little Hawkeye Conference should be strong again and there will be some figuring out for the Osky squad to do to see where they will land as the season progresses.

"We play in a pretty strong conference so we will have to be ready to play every meet," Foster said. "I'm looking forward to seeing some competition within the team for those varsity and even JV spots. We can only play six per team and there are 31 guys. There should be some friendly competitiveness that hopefully makes everyone better."

Colin Peters can be reached at 641-672-2581, by email at cpeters@oskyherald.com or on Twitter @ColinPetersOH.

Read more:
Osky golfers looking to replace top two from state team - Yahoo News