<strong>T</strong>he early 1970s were good to Franklin boys golf, with four consecutive visits to the state finals.
After clinging to the outer edges of the top 10 the first two years, the Grizzly Cubs made a spirited charge in 1974. Coach Dick Foster’s squad placed second to Anderson, 636-639, at Old Oakland Golf Course in Indianapolis.
Even now, nearly five decades later, Foster is convinced he had the best team in Indiana.
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Click here to purchase photos from this gallery“My No. 5 player was Dean Abplanalp, who was a sophomore. He shot a 73 at the Lafayette Jeff Regional at Battle Ground,” said Foster, 82, who lives in Franklin, possesses a razor-sharp memory and still plays to a 13 handicap.
“When you’ve got your No. 5 player coming off with a 73, you know you’re going to go somewhere.”
The coach doesn’t stop there.
Foster tells of the time senior Paul Marchand, the Grizzly Cubs’ top player, put three straight rounds together in which he carded 32 on the back nine. Or when the No. 3 player, junior Ken Sanders, sprayed the ball all over the front nine at Hillview Country Club en route to an uncharacteristic 44.
Sanders promised his coach at the turn he would still break 80, and backed it up after scoring a 33 on the back side.
Franklin’s other two starters, senior Steve Yount and junior Chuck Winning, held down the second and fourth spots, respectively.
“We got close,” said Marchand, 63, who is in his first summer as director of golf at The Madison Club in La Quinta, California, one of the country’s premier golf courses and one that makes use of the Santa Rosa Mountains as part of its picturesque setting.
“When you look back we had a lot of tournament wins, and it was a special team.”
Yount, an attorney in Indianapolis, said that Grizzly Cubs team was inspired by the program’s previous successes.
“The guys on the team loved golf and had been playing for years. All of us more or less lived at Hillview during the summers,” said Yount, 64. “Our goal was to get to the state meet, and it had been a tradition here. We all grew up watching older Franklin players who were good and wanted to be just like them.”
In those days, both 18-hole rounds of the state finals were played the same day. Moreover, caddies were allowed.
In Franklin’s case, members of the school’s boys basketball squad, who only a few months earlier advanced to the state finals for a second consecutive season, brought their celebrity status to Old Oakland to caddy for their friends.
The group included Trester Award recipients Jon and Don McGlocklin.
“The McGlocklins were there, and after the first 18 they lied down beneath a shade tree. One of them said, ‘Boy, I’m glad that’s over,’” Foster said, laughing. “I said, ‘Boys, get up. It’s not over.’”
The meet concluded with a hint of controversy, with Marchand taking a triple-bogey 8 on one of Old Oakland’s par 5s. It was thought Marchand hit his drive out of bounds, though it was eventually discovered that wasn’t the case.
He scored an 8 with his provisional ball; he was given a 5 with his original ball.
“There were (high school) principals out there that thought they knew about golf,” said Foster of the ruling. “That’s just the way it was decided. If (Marchand’s) 5 had counted, we would have tied Anderson, and our highest (individual score) was still a lot better than their highest score.”
Anderson celebrated its fifth boys golf title; Franklin was deprived of its second (coach Fuzzy Vandivier’s Cubs tied South Bend Riley for the 1938 title at Speedway Golf Course).
Franklin returned to the finals the following season, finishing fifth in the team standings. The Grizzly Cubs last advanced to the big stage in 1986, the 17th and final time the state finals were held at Old Oakland.
“We were all very motivated by what the basketball team had done. The golf team wanted to do their part,” said Marchand, who played at the University of Houston. Fred Couples and longtime CBS broadcaster Jim Nantz were among his teammates, and both remain two of his closest friends.
“For the basketball team and cheerleaders to be there … those years in Franklin, they were truly magical.”
