Photo submitted by Walker Hennen: The 2026 Minneota boys and girls golf teams.

MINNEOTA — The Minneota boys and girls golfing team has seen an exciting amount of growth, and is off to a solid start to the 2026 spring season as the Vikings look to mix its old and young talent for a successful year.

The Vikings have a large amount of participation on both teams this season that will allow them to competitively compete at meets throughout the year. The girls team in past years didn’t have enough players to qualify for a full team.

“This year is, I think, is the first year since 2018 that we’ve actually had a girls team. It’s really exciting for us, just as a program, to hopefully continue to build our girls program and have a team in years future,” head coach Walker Hennen said of the girl’s team. “I have two girls that played last year in Ava [Panka] and Alexis Thostenson, so hoping to continue to see them grow. Ava’s had a pretty good start to the year here with winning a couple medals … [We’re hoping to] just help the other girls grow and get accustomed to playing in a meet, because that’s a lot different than just playing with family and friends.”

Notably, both Minneota teams have made big strides to open the season in a Camden Conference that is loaded with talent this year.

The boys team won their home invitational on April 21 and the girls took third, and the girls team placed second at the Camden South meet on April 16 and the boys had another first-place finish.

The Vikings’ boys team has a handful of returning varsity experience, including Owen Dalager, Blayze Hulzebos, Jase Sorensen, Easton Sheik and Randy Sorensen, along with a lineup of other golfers that are available. Sheik is the lone senior this season as well.

“We’re pretty young … We have three sophomores [Dalager, Jase and Randy Sorensen] that are on the varsity team that all played last year as well, and a freshman [Hulzebos] who played all year last year as well. Our sixth spot, we have four or five guys that are competing for that last spot. We have a playoff every week to see who’s playing well, and we put them in at that last spot,” Hennen said. “Expectations for the boys, I hope to be competitive at the conference and section and state level this year, and hopefully help them become more consistent around the greens, putting, chipping, approach shots … As far as team scores, hoping to get in the 150s this season for a 9-hole team score.”

Dalager in particular had a standout-year last season, being the lone member of both Minneota teams to compete at the state tournament individually. He took seventh individually with a 151, and was near the top of the leaderboard for a majority of the first day of the tournament, and finished with four total birdies.

“He’s [Dalager] been hitting the ball really well so far. He had a really good score in Marshall at the season opener, shooting a 75, so that was good to see him return and play very well at the start,” Hennen said. “Hopefully continuing to improve and hopefully getting closer to that par, and maybe having a few scores under par this year would be a goal for him and us as a program.”

In the section tournament, the boys team as a whole placed third while Lakeview won the section to earn a state tournament berth. Individually, Dalager finished in third with a 156 for his spot at state. Hulzebos and Sorenson had good performances as well, placing eighth and 11th, respectively.

In their big win at the home invite this season, the boys team took first with a 164, 10 strokes under Canby’s runner-up finish of 174. Sorensen led the charge with a first-place finish after carding a 3-over 39, with Dalager coming in second with a 4-over 40. Hulzebos also followed one stroke behind with a 5-over 41.

Minneota is well-balanced in its talent, with anyone having the capability to step up.

At their Camden South invite, also taking first place, Dalager and Hulzebos shared a first-place finish with a 2-over 38. Sorensen also finished in the top-10 with an eighth-place finish.

The girls team is also trending in the right direction to start the season, along with Panka returning for her junior season that played a big role last year.

As the girls team didn’t have enough golfers to qualify at the section tournament last season, Panka had a strong performance and finished 12th individually with a score of 210.

The girls placed third at Minneota’s home invite with Panka leading the charge on a runner-up finish of 10-over 46. Other golfers that will look to have a big season had big performances as well, including Ava Rost finishing in eighth and Thostenson and Brynn Rost sharing 12th place.

Cheyenne Hoffman and Addysen Kiley are another pair on the team this season, having good starts.

Panka also led the Vikings at the Camden South invite with a third place finish, where the team took a second place finish.

As for both teams setting a strong foundation at the beginning of the season to continuing building off of with a mix of returning and newcoming talent, both Minneota golf teams have their eyes set on making it a memorable season full of growth.

“It is a pretty exciting year for Minneota golf. We’re just going to kind of enjoy the ride, and it’s exciting to see the base of our golfers be freshmen and 10th graders, so hopefully having sustained success for the next couple of years [would be] pretty fun for the programs,” Hennen said. “There’s some pretty good golf teams in the Camden conference. So, it’ll be a good test for us throughout the year here to go up against some of those solid teams and see how we compare.”