Prep golf: Bliss for Kaneland's Lucas Pehl, Knights win Interstate 8

SUGAR GROVE – Kaneland’s home course may be Hughes Creek Golf Course in Elburn, but Lucas Pehl is all too familiar with Sugar Grove’s Bliss Creek Golf Course.

Pehl, a resident of Sugar Grove, has been playing for years on the course. That work was evident, as his 1-under-par 69 led the way as Kaneland won the Interstate 8 boys tournament title Monday with a team score of 294. Sycamore took second with a 317.

“I live, like, five minutes away. I’ve been playing this all my life, basically,” Pehl said. “I can just drive down here, play a quick practice round. I just know the course by heart by now.”

Pehl entered the day with the sixth best average on the team, but got in several practice rounds in the days leading up to the conference meet.

“The past few days I’ve been taking notes on the greens and on the fairways, and I knew I wanted to play well,” Pehl said.

Kaneland coach Mark Meyer was ecstatic with the all-around performance from the Knights.

“Obviously, for a kid to shoot 69, first time he’s shot under par ever, to do that at the conference meet, to win the conference, I couldn’t be happier for him,” Meyer said. “He’s a great kid. He was so pumped on that last hole when he sunk a bending 8-footer to keep it under par.”

Pehl was optimistic heading into the day.

“I thought I had more of a chance at just top five, but not winning it. But once I got through nine holes, and I heard around other people’s scores, I was like, ‘I have a chance of winning this.’ ” Pehl said. “I grinded it out, I got a few birdies, I think a bogey in there, but I was able to secure it.”

Sycamore’s Nate Cohn shot the best score for the Spartans, a 76. He said he was optimistic about his team’s chances to advance through regionals and even past sectionals.

“We’re playing all right, but we could be playing better,” Cohn said. “It just depends. We’ve all got to play good on a good day.”

Spartans coach Dan Wheeler said that the Spartans are consistently shooting about a 320 as a team, and expects that to continue. He said that Bliss Creek was an ideal course to prepare for the regional meet Monday.

“I think the No. 1 problem for three or four is having a really bad blowup hole where they get a triple bogey or quadruple bogey because their driver gets them in trouble, so this one almost forces them to take an iron off the tee,” Wheeler said. “Monday at Sandwich, it’s going to be a very similar type of course where you’ve got to be in great position off the tee.”

Sycamore junior varsity player Alex Grados carded his first-ever hole-in-one on the sixth hole.

“It just sort of happened,” Grados said. “I just hit the pin, and it just went right in and made the loud clink and dropped straight down.”

By the numbers: Kaneland's Bryce Stair took second with a 73, and Cody Ganzon was third with a 75. Other varsity scores from Kaneland were Josh Pehl (77), Ryan Milton (78) and Hagan Rank (81). Josh Pehl took fifth, and Milton tied for sixth. Other varsity scores for Sycamore came from Sam Faulhaber (79), Thomas Fischer (79), Iain Purdom (83), David Beaty (86) and Ian Macalister (88). Faulhaber and Fischer tied for eighth.

Beyond the stats: Grados was mobbed by his teammates outside of the clubhouse when he returned from his round.

They said it: "To see the guys having that much fun and celebrating with [Grados], varsity all the way seniors down to freshman, having that great team feel and celebrating with him," Wheeler said. "It's fun to see from a coaching standpoint that we're building a climate and a culture that we're all one big team."

Up next: Sycamore and Kaneland are joined by DeKalb County program Genoa-Kingston as each competes in the Class 2A Sandwich Regional at Edgebrook Golf Course on Monday. The top three teams advance to a 2A sectional.