Sun staff
An undefeated regular season and an Eastern Cincinnati Conference regular season and tournament title translated to a golf cart full of individual accolades for the Milford High School Lady Eagles.
The ECC, in only its second season, has only known one school to stand atop its rankings at the end of the season and this time, the Lady Eagles were able to accomplish that feat in even more impressive fashion than during their 17-1 season in 2012.
Even before the Lady Eagles finished their 2013 campaign a perfect 17-0, head coach Sandy Garrison had a hunch that her team was special. Only two matches into the season, the conference’s eventual Coach of the Year was using words like “special” and “great improvement.”
With high expectations seemingly destined for Milford, the team lived up to them and then some, playing a bulked up schedule and still going unblemished. The team was so well rounded, in fact, that eight members of the team earned All Conference honors.
Leading the way in the awards was No. 1 player Megan Creager. Creager, who was named the ECC Athlete of the Year, led the conference in scoring average by more than five strokes per nine holes. Her 39.10 average over 216 holes not only left her as one of the best players in the conference, but near the top of the city.
Creager’s junior campaign included not only a conference championship and medalist honors at the conference tournament at Bel-wood Country Club, but also a district tournament appearance for the first time in her career. Creager shot a 7-over par round of 79 at a difficult Weatherwax Golf Course to finish three strokes out of a possible playoff for an individual qualifying spot in the state tournament.
Just a junior, Creager seems to have gotten a taste for the big time and is committed to continue working towards some of her ambitious goals.
“Megan has some goals of her own that are pretty lofty (before leaving high school),” Garrison said. “She wants to reach the upper echelon of the state. She will continue to put herself in tournaments that will push her. She needs to improve her short game, read greens better and adjust to different green speeds.”
Joining Creager on the First Team All-ECC is last year’s Athlete of the Year and fellow district tournament qualifier Aly Severns. Severns, who worked her way out of an early-season slump to solidify her standing as the Lady Eagles’ No. 2, finished the year with a 9-hole average (44.30) second only to her teammate Creager.
A solid contributing member to Garrison’s program for the past few years, Severns is planning to continue her career at the next level where she will play as a preferred walk-on at Tusculum College in Greeneville, Tenn.
Adding more clout to an already impressive one-two punch was Abby Swenson, a sophomore on Garrison’s squad. Swenson, the third and final First Team selection matched Severns 9-hole average of 44.30 and will be back to help the Lady Eagles next season.
Milford had three more golfers receive special recognition from their conference, all of whom will be eligible to tee it up for the Lady Eagles again next year, making a three-peat in the ECC a distinct possibility.
In order of average, junior Chelsea Nagy (48.90), sophomore Rachel Berger (51.00) and junior Rebecca Waits (51.90) were named to the Second Team All-Conference.
All in all, the Lady Eagles will return five of their six All-Conference selections in 2014 as well as some other younger players who had promising seasons on the junior varsity level.