6 hours ago 2

High school girls golf: Led by Kennedee Pearson, Woods Cross claims first-ever state crown

It’s been a climb for Woods Cross since starting its girls golf progam, and on Tuesday, the Wildcats reached the mountaintop.

Woods Cross hoisted its first-ever girls golf state championship trophy on Tuesday at Glendale Golf Course, finishing 82-over during the two-day event to take the crown.

“I’m proud of them. They’ve put in a lot of hard work and effort,” Woods Cross coach Brandon Pearson said.

“Some of them are fairly new to golf and they learned quickly. Their athleticism really showed and they’ve been very teachable ... So we’ve been able to get that dialed in and their learning curve has been quick.”

Medalist honors went to Bonneville’s Whitni Johnson, who posted the only under-par score in the field, finishing 3-under, and that effort made it a close race between Bonneville and Woods Cross down the stretch.

During the back nine on Tuesday, Bonneville shot just 11-over, compared to 20-over from Woods Cross, but wasn’t quite able to close the gap as the Wildcats closed strong enough to seal the championship, winning by just three strokes.

“Honestly, it wasn’t until the 18th hole (that he realized Woods Cross was going to win) because Bonneville put a lot of pressure on us to start the back nine,” Pearson said.

“And a few of our players were struggling while it seemed, while theirs were theirs were catching wind and playing well. And so for us it took just grinding it out at the end to get it done and they did. So I’m super proud of them for that.”

Despite firing a 36-over as a team in the second and final day, compared to Woods Cross’s 40-over, Bonneville couldn’t overcome a 53-over performance on day one, as the Wildcats shot 42-over on the first day to give themselves a major leg up on the field heading into Tuesday.

“I felt good coming into today,“ Pearson said. ”They played great as a team. They scored better today, but I felt like we played better as a team yesterday. Kennedee anchored us both days with 74-74, which kind of provided the consistency we needed.“

Kennedee Pearson led Woods Cross by finishing four-over over two days on the par-72 course.

“She’s been our consistent player throughout the season. She had a scoring average of about 73, which really kind of solidified, helped the team scoring that we needed,” Pearson said.

“She ended up being the Region 5 medalist and she was super proud of that, super proud of her for that. So that low scoring for us as a team really helped us to be able to, if another player was off, her score really still kept us in every match.”

Woods Cross’s Tess Poulsen fired a 20-over 164 to finish in a tie for 11th place among individuals, while Vivian Oaks was 26-over to finish in 16th place and Makenzie Pearson was 32-over to finish in a tie for 24th place.

“Tess had a great round yesterday, struggled through the middle part of her round today and regrouped at the end. And same thing for Vivian and then Mackenzie Pearson was our good fourth anchor to bring it home for us,” Pearson said.

It all culminated in Woods Cross’s first-ever girls golf state title.

“I’m so proud of this whole team and myself. This has been a really big goal of mine for a long time, since freshman year,” Kennedee Pearson said.

“We didn’t really have a program, and so building it up these past four years has been awesome and it’s just been so cool to see everyone play great, and I’m just really proud of everyone and myself.”