With the start of the fall quickly approaching, cold and windy weather conditions are common in northwest Ohio and its surrounding areas. Cold and wet conditions are hard for any athlete to deal with, but especially hard to deal with when you are trying to score well on a golf course. The weather played a role in both the men’s and women’s golf teams’ weekend tournaments, as the women saw the inclement conditions as a blessing, while the men saw it as a curse.

The women’s golf team, which hosted the Lady Falcon Invitational at Forrest Creason Golf Course this weekend, welcomed the bad weather, especially during the practice rounds.

“Forrest Creason is our home course and we practice there everyday, so when it rained during the practice rounds, it was to our advantage,” junior Jenny Schnipke said. “The rain changed the course and didn’t help the other teams during the tournament.”

The rain certainly didn’t affect the Falcons’ play, as they took home team laurels, eight strokes ahead of the pack with a team score of 662. Senior Shelley Binzel won the tournament individually, while Schnipke improved her seventh-place position after the first round to an overall third place finish by the end of the tournament, two positions behind Binzel.

“Everybody’s playing real well, and we’re happy with this weekend’s tournament. Coming off a winning tournament, we should continue to play well for the rest of the season,” Schnipke said.

Binzel finished first overall this weekend and was the tournament’s medalist. Binzel broke her own school record with a 148 for 36 holes. With back-to-back scores of 74, Binzel dominated the field. It was a matter of time before Binzel won the Falcons’ home tournament, with second-place finishes in her freshman and junior years and a third-place finish her sophomore year.

Kurt Thomas, the Falcons’ coach, was also extremely happy with the team’s performance in the bad weather this weekend.

“We played very well, although we were down in the first round we were able to come back and win the tournament in bad conditions.”

The Falcons were coming off a tournament at Ann Arbor and took full advantage of the home course this weekend.

“We are headed in the right direction for the rest of the season,” Thomas said. “After a good tournament at Ball State we struggled in Michigan, but were able to come back strong and win this weekend.”

The team, however, will have to wait to try their hand at winning another tournament. The team has a week off before they travel to Penn State to compete in the Nittany Lion Invitational.

The men’s team finished in seventh place out of 15 teams in the Earl Yestingmeister Invitational, held in Yorktown, Ind. and hosted by Ball State University. The Falcons had high hopes going into the tournament, and were undoubtedly disappointed.

The Falcons came out shooting well, carding a two-under that had them tied for fourth after the first round. With the start of the second round came the bad weather. The Falcons were unable to maintain their outstanding play in the later rounds and shot 16 over as a team in the final round.

Sophomore Austin Chase led the Falcons this weekend by finishing tied for 23rd. Regardless of his team-leading score of 219, Chase was still highly disappointed after the tournament.

“The team was disappointed with the tournament this weekend,” he said. “We were two under after the first round and with our disappointing third round, we weren’t very happy with our performance.”

Junior Andy Miller, although disappointed as well, thought this tournament will help the team in the long run.

“Although we struggled in the tournament, I feel that this tournament was a really good experience for our younger guys, because it was really the first time they have had to deal with bad conditions since they have been here,” Miller said.

Miller finished tied for 28th with a 220 this weekend. Following Miller were freshman Bud Ziglar, who tied for 30th, and Christopher Leake, who tied for 37th. Sophomore Craig Pickerel struggled with the team’s worst finish with a 228, which was good enough to tie him for 63rd.