Sept. 27, 2010

Contact: Greg Murphy

By: Robert Ivory

The women's golf program at Cleveland State celebrates its ninth year of competition in 2010-2011. The roster for this year's squad is much different from others in the history of the program.

Let me introduce to you Steff Camarata, Micaela Cronin, Shelly Ford, and Madeline Kaminski, all freshman on this year's golf team.

Why are these girls so special?

They happen to make up two thirds of the entire golf team, with the other two members (Lisa Barber and Ariel Sparrow) in their sophomore year at Cleveland State.

"I was not really worried," Kaminski said about having only two sophomores on the team. "I was just excited to be on a team where people wanted to play well and wanted to practice all the time.

"I looked too, at the prospect we are going to be good in two or three years," Ford said. "I saw that in the next few years we are going to be pretty competitive."

Just because the players on the team are young, does not mean that they are inexperienced. The four girls pointed out that Barber and Sparrow already have maturity and experience that helps the team.

"I don't feel that we are missing out because they let us know about previous tournaments," Camarata said.

The teammates not only have the challenge of a youthful team, but they also have to get use to play at the collegiate level. Camarata explained it best.

"This is all new. It's completely different, the courses are harder, and it's more competitive."

In building chemistry, the team knows it is not as important as other sports, but the game relieves some of the newness that the team has with each other.

"The game of golf is different because you do not have to work as a team like a team sport does," Ford said. "You just go out there and play golf, like we all have for a long time. In that way, it's easy because we know how to play and play well."

Fortunately, for Cronin and Kaminski, they both came from the same high school, Chaminade Julienne in Dayton.

"We looked at a lot of the same schools for golf," Kaminski said. "It was an opportunity we did not want to pass up."

"I don't think we planned on going to the same school," Cronin said. "We both liked Cleveland State and it worked out." A big piece of the puzzle in bringing these girls together were fourth year head coach Steve Weir and assistant coach Nathan Miklos.

"They just seemed like the type of coaches I wanted to play for," Cronin said.

"They did not intimidate you, like other coaches did," Camarata added. "Others schools did not ever acknowledge your major and the coaches here made it clear that school came first. They really care about us, and it's not all about winning, but it's about going to school and getting an education."

Although the team has plenty of youth now, the current members of the team know that they could be the foundation of something special.

"I think we are going to be really good," Ford said. "As freshmen, there is the stress of being alone for the fist time and not knowing what to expect, but we will improve and get better as we adjust to our new environment."

The team has already seen what competition is ahead as they have played in a pair tournaments this fall. The team finished fifth (of eight) at the Youngstown State Invitational and 12th of 15 at the Bucknell Invitational. The team, however, knows that this is just the first taste of collegiate golf.

"I just want to play as well as I know I can," Kaminski said. "I don't think any of us can say that we have played as well as we truly can. I think all of us want to prove that we should be here and deserve to be here."

"We all feel that we are all in this together," Cronin added. "It just shows that we are at a good starting place and we all can get better over time and improve a lot."

The team knows they can play better, but they already have the hardware on their minds. "With such a young team, we know it's a long shot, but winning the conference would be really great," Camarata said. "I think that it's in the back of all of our minds. It's going to be just working at it, gaining confidence and experience."

The coaches may have picked these four to come to Cleveland State and winning the Horizon League may be a long shot in the first year, but that experience has already been felt at CSU.

Don't forget, the men won the trophy two years in a row (2007-08 and 2008-09). "It's intimidating to see the Horizon League trophy," Camarata said.