Kuntz, Kartusch take top honours

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This article was published 29/10/2024 (671 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Few players were a greater threat to flagsticks across the province than Braxton Kuntz and Addison Kartusch this summer.

Hunting pins was a regular occurrence for two of Manitoba’s brightest young golfers, and Kuntz and Kartusch were honoured for their strong play as they were named Golf Manitoba’s male and female Amateur Golfer of the Year, respectively, at St. Charles Country Club Tuesday evening.

Kuntz, still just 20 years old, won the award for the fourth consecutive year and joined Rhonda Orr (five), Todd Fanning (five), Garth Collings (five) and Rob McMillan (six) as the only four-time winners.

“I mean, those are some of the best players to come out of our province and to hear my name mentioned with them is something I’m really proud to accomplish,” Kuntz, who is in his fourth year at Ball State University (Indiana), told the Free Press by phone.

“I was super thankful, just proud that the hard work that I put in and being able to play well at the right time has really paid off for me. Obviously, getting Player of the Year again is something I’m really proud to achieve and I think it just shows that the work I’m putting in is getting results.”

It was the first time Kartusch won the yearly award, and there’s no doubt it was deserved.

The 18-year-old from St. Charles dominated the local women’s scene with three wins, becoming the first woman to win the match play, women’s amateur and junior championship in the same summer. Her amateur and junior titles came on consecutive weekends, leaving little debate about who was the best female amateur in the province.

“I gotta say, it was pretty fun. When I look back at it, I realize how much fun I actually had. I had some pretty bad holes on some of my rounds and I could’ve quit, I could’ve given up, but I think it was fun because I was able to bounce back,” said Kartusch, who is in her first year at Bowling Green State University (Ohio).

Kartusch carried her hot streak to the national stage, where she carded a two-under 70 on the final day of the Canadian Junior Girls Championship to finish in a tie for third.

She called the final round at Marine Drive Golf Club in Vancouver the highlight of her summer.

“I knew what I wanted to do, of course, everyone wants to be in that final group and make the cut. I was just nervous because you never know if you’re going to make the cut or not… and I think that two-under day just showed me that I can perform on such a big stage,” she said.

“It wasn’t necessarily that I felt pressure from other people to perform like that, it was just from myself and that’s what I really loved about that is I just wanted to do well. I had just trusted myself and all the work I had done throughout my whole career and I just kind of let it happen.”

Kuntz captured the men’s amateur championship for the fourth summer in a row — the first player to accomplish that feat — and enjoyed the best season of his collegiate career, recording a pair of tied-for-thirds and a tie-for-12th for the Cardinals.

A busy summer for the Breezy Bend member included more valuable experience in professional events. In June, he reached the final qualifying stage for the U.S. Open — where he played alongside PGA Tour pro Justin Suh — and in August he received a sponsor’s exemption into the Manitoba Open at Southwood, which featured pros from the PGA Tour Americas.

“I didn’t play my best in the final stage but just being able to have that opportunity to compete for a spot in a major championship and watching these other guys do it was pretty cool.”

The best experience, though, Kuntz said, came in early August at the Canadian Men’s Amateur Championship in Saskatoon, where he finished just three shots back of the winner.

“Being able to play with a couple of the best amateurs really in the world and then getting to play in front of all those people, even though I didn’t win, being able to come third and compete against some of the better amateurs really gave me a lot to learn,” he said.

Kuntz had planned to turn pro next summer but had a change of heart after recently being accepted to Golf Canada’s NextGen national amateur team. He is guaranteed a year with the program but may spend even longer taking advantage of the premium training while his tournaments are paid for.

Next week, Kuntz and the 10-man team will tee it up for a pair of events in Argentina.

“I’m thinking I might stay amateur for a little longer now and take advantage of all the resources they have,” he said. “I can’t see myself being on it for more than a year and a half, maybe two years.”

Zostrianos Giordani-Gross, Allan McDonald and Marco Trstenjak were the men’s award finalists, while Orr, Charmaine Hayden and Jeri Lafleche were runner-ups for the female honours.

joshua.frey-sam@freepress.mb.ca

X: @jfreysam