ANDERSON — Many kids beg their parents to let them drink Mountain Dew.
These kids are winning events sponsored by the soft drink.
Anderson middle schoolers Morgan Nadaline and Colin Proctor each recently received the Mountain Dew Junior Golf Tour Player of the Year award, the first time two Anderson players had ever received the award in the same year.
The tour, which is sponsored by the Indiana Golf Association, takes place from early June until August and allows golfers aged 13 to 19 to travel around the state and play elite talent at some of the best courses.
The fact the Anderson duo took two of the three junior awards given out speaks to the competitiveness of the Madison County schools.
“This makes you feel good. It makes you feel like what we do here on the local level pays off,” said Michael Proctor, Colin’s father and a director of the Madison County Junior Golf Tour. “It makes you feel good about having a chance to compete and win locally, and then it gives you the confidence to compete at the state level and win at the state level. Then once you’ve done that, the sky is the limit.”
Colin Proctor’s résumé is one many experienced high-school players would be happy to have.
He won two tour events this year, at Lakes of the Four Seasons (Crown Point) and Highland Lake (Richmond), and added runner-up finishes at Westwood (New Castle), The Player’s Club (Yorktown) and Brookshire (Carmel).
But Proctor’s performance in championship play may have been his most impressive.
He won his division at the Age Group Championship, thus qualifying him for the Boys State Junior Championship.
There, he made it to match play and was the youngest player remaining in the field as he advanced to the Round of 16.
“It’s pretty exciting knowing that I’m good enough to win that award already, and I’m not even in high school yet,” said a softspoken Proctor.
Nadaline was even more dominant in her division.
She won five total events during the season — at Fox Prairie (Noblesville), Willowbrook (Connersville), Valparaiso CC, Highland Lake (Richmond) and the Mountain Dew Tour Championship — and finished runner-up at the Age Group Championship.
Nadaline also recorded a top-10 finish at the Indiana Section Junior PGA.
“It was a good honor to get that (award),” Nadaline said. “Especially with as much work and effort as I’ve put into it.”
Her father, AHS golf coach Joe Nadaline, was equally excited about his daughter’s honor.
“It was a culmination of all year, all the tournaments she’s played in,” he said. “She had a really good summer, and she placed well in a lot of tournaments. It’s just a really good thing for her.”
While both Proctor and Nadaline’s awards are impressive feats that bring pride to the city of Anderson, it is the two together, in one year, that is truly special.
Neither father could remember a time when one Madison County golfer had walked away with the Player of the Year honors. For two kids that grew up as friends and still talk on a regular basis, there couldn’t be a better way to end the year.
“It’s cool to see that we’ve still made the same achievements, and we’re at the same point in our game where we’ve gotten the same honors,” Nadaline said.
Added Michael Proctor: “I don’t think there has been a player from Madison County to ever win that award, and to have two in the same season was remarkable.”
Nadaline and Proctor will be back at it again next summer. They are both still young golfers, trying to become the best players they can possibly be, and the award will not go to either one’s head.
As Nadaline explains, there is still a lot of work to be done.
“I want to keep my scores a lot lower and try to win more tournaments,” she said of her goals for next season. “I want to keep placing high in as many tournaments as I can.”
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