Top Bulldog is headed for the big time

By John Kovach

Poland sophomore Allison Mitzel will compete in the Optimist, an international golf tournament.

POLAND — Why does Allison Mitzel love to play golf so much?

“I love it because I can play golf with my grandpa and dad and play golf with anyone,” said Mitzel, a sophomore at Poland High who led the Bulldogs’ girls team to the Division II state championship.

“I started golf because my father [George] and grandfather [Lee Sandstrom] wanted me to look into golf. They wanted me to start when I was young so that I would have something to do and to have fun with, and it progressed from there.”

Mitzel shot a career-best, school-record 74 in the second round of the state tournament — that included pars on the first nine holes — to help Poland win the championship by one stroke. She said her grandfather and father encouraged her to begin golfing at about 7 years old.

“But I didn’t take it seriously until the last two years. I played a lot of other sports and didn’t focus on golf until high school,” said Mitzel, who wound up with a team-best 84-74—158 in the state tournament.

She led Poland to a two-day score of 346-333—679 for a one-stroke win over Tipp City Tippecanoe (680).

Mitzel’s 74 was ranked 14th in the state for 2008.

She also was the All-American Conference tournament medalist at Tamer Win, leading the Bulldogs to the title.

Now Mitzel wants to test her abilities on the national and international levels, and hopes to find out just how good she is when she competes in the Optimist International Tournament of Champions Saturday and Sunday at West Palm Beach, Fla., at the National PGA Resort.

She will be among 15 girls competing in the 14-18 age group over 36 holes. A practice round is set for Friday.

Mitzel, also daughter of Lori Mitzel, qualified by winning the 14-15 age group Optimist district pre-qualifying tournament in May at Deer Creek in Hubbard by shooting an 80.

She advanced to the Optimist state tournament held in June in Middletown and shot a 87, but did not win.

However, she still qualified for the International by winning the district.

“This is the first time that I will play in an international tournament,” said Mitzel, who expects to learn and be challenged. “It will be a lot of experience to be golfing with these people. They probably are going to be really good. My main goal is to shoot somewhere in the 80s, because I heard it is kind of a tough course. So this will be a good test to see how I rank with players from around the U.S. and the world.”

Mitzel said her objective is to attend as many golf camps and play as much golf as possible to try to improve so she can earn a college scholarship.

“That’s what I really want,” she emphasized.

She went to the Duke Academy of Golf at Duke University last July.

“That’s where I changed my grip, and that helped me to lower my scores,” said Mitzel, who also went to a one-day camp at Kent State.

She also played a lot of golf over the summer.

“I started in May with the Optimist,” she said. “I played in a lot of Junior PGA tournaments and also local tournaments.”

She won five times in the Northern Ohio PGA Kenny Novak Tournaments last summer, and won the Kenny Novak Championship at Walden Golf & Country Club in Aurora. She also was named Junior Player of the Year for 13-15 girls.

She will have two more years of golf at Poland to help her get ready for college.

“I gave up basketball this year to focus on golf for the rest of my high school career,” said Mitzel, who also is an outstanding student with a 3.97 grade-point average.

Her golf pro is Dennis Miller, Mill Creek Park’s golf director.

kovach@vindy.com