Moore bemoans putting, shoots 83 at first round of state

Final round tee time: 9:20 a.m. on hole No. 1

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

BATTLE GROUND — Molly Moore shot an 83 at the first round of the IHSAA state finals at Battle Ground Golf Club Friday and stands in a tie for 36th place in a field of 108 golfers.

Moore’s round included one birdie, five pars and 12 bogeys.

She is 16 strokes behind leader Taylor Snively going into today’s final round. Snively, a Zionsville junior, is seeking to be state medalist for the third straight year.

Moore will tee off at 9:20 a.m. today from hole No. 1.

Zionsville shot a 293 and leads second-place Carmel by 15 strokes in the team standings. Zionsville is seeking a third straight team title.

Moore shot a 75 to win sectional medalist Sept. 21 and a 77 at the regional Sept. 26. She had four birdies in each round.

She said her putter was not as effective Friday.

“Very iffy,” Moore said. “I mean, it’s a good score for state. I remember my freshman year, the first round I think I was in the 100s. So obviously that’s good. The short game really got to me. The putting. I had 41 putts, which compared to regionals I probably had 30 putts. And so that’s a big difference, and it definitely shows on the score.”

Moore said she did not think nerves had to do with her putting issues.

“It may have been, but the putting got worse over time,” Moore said. “The first few holes, I did not three-putt, and it was fine. I think I got anxious or something. Nerves could be it, but I think it was just my stroke. It was not the greens. They’re pretty simple greens, somewhat similar to Round Barn (Golf Club at Mill Creek).” 

And as coach Dan Bailey noted, a coach cannot help a golfer once the ball is on the green.

“It was a struggle on the greens today. That was kind of a helpless feeling because we can’t get up there on the greens. We can’t help them read it. We can’t talk to them about speeds, stuff like that. So they’re kind of on their own in the greens, and when it starts going bad, it’s a real uncomfortable feeling.”

Moore’s birdie came on No. 5, a 142-yard par-3. 

She put her tee shot within three feet before dropping in the birdie putt. That was one of only seven birdies No. 5 yielded on the day.

“It’s one of my least favorite holes actually,” Moore said. “And so at the invite here a few weeks ago, I doubled (double bogeyed) it. I went in the sand, and I’ve always been scared of the sand trap there. So when I got there and I got my yardage, it was a perfect ‘A’ wedge for me, and so I felt confident with it, and I was just going to go right for the pin, and, yeah, it worked out. The people surrounding me, the coaches, said it almost went in. And so that’s always great. … I was very happy about that.”

Rochester coach Dan Bailey praised Moore’s ball striking and said a good week of practice led into her good round.

“Today was as good as I’ve seen her hit it,” Bailey said. “I told her at the end, her score was not a bad score at all. It’s a good golf score, but it’s not indicative of how she hit the ball. She has worked really hard the last week-and-a-half or so on just some little swing mechanics, and she found something, and she’s hitting the ball really well. That’s really nice to see.

“She made the comment, ‘I should have been doing this all year long.’ Well, if it were that easy, we would have been, but sometimes, it just takes time to figure out. I told her sometimes it might be when I’m trying to get you to do something, I don’t say it in a way that clicks. A week or so ago, it clicked.”

Battle Ground is a temporary home for the state finals. Prairie View Golf Club in Carmel, which had hosted the girls state finals every fall since 2016, is closed due to flooding there this summer.

Moore had played Battle Ground on Sept. 5 as part of the Lady Broncho Invitational, the annual tournament hosted by Lafayette Jeff.

Both Moore and Bailey said the wind was a factor. Moore said she often felt like she was hitting into a headwind and often went up a club as an adjustment. Bailey said she did not guess wrong on club selection all day.

“The wind is definitely a factor today,” Bailey said. “I don’t know what it is – 10 or 15 miles an hour. So we had to do a lot of calculating and educated guesses because there were very few times today where she felt like it was perfect yardage. All of these girls, they’re very comfortable with the yardage that they hit clubs. And then when you throw in a 10-or-15 mile-an-hour wind, it kind of throws all that off. So I feel like she did a really good job with that. That;s not something that’s easy to do.”

A veteran of many events of various summer tours, Moore said she tries to treat state like a typical round. She made state in 2024 as part of the Rochester team that finished in a tie for 12th. She had rounds of 100 and 94 and finished in 90th place among individuals.

“After I hit that first tee, obviously that’s really the only difference,” Moore said. “And then right after I hit that, it was just a normal round of golf. Nothing big, nothing spectacular, just normal.”

Bailey said it is not so easy.

“That is impossible,” Bailey said. “But she did a really good job. She made it as normal as it could be, for sure. There wasn't a single time when I thought she lost concentration, never felt like the moment got to her. She really did play like it was a regular round of golf.”