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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Entering Monday's final round of the Topeka Golf Association City Stroke Play championship at Topeka Country Club, the individual title was definitely up for grabs.
Recent Topeka West graduate Myles Alonzo and Washburn Rural product Luke Leonetti went into the final 18 holes locked in a tie for the lead while Max Stuckey-Halley was just a stroke back.
Recent Topeka West graduate Myles Alonzo captured the TGA City Stroke Play championship Monday at Topeka Country Club by nine strokes. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
But by the end of the day, Alonzo, who won the city high school championship at TCC in April, was all alone at the top of the mountain, carding a final-round 68 to win the title by a whopping nine strokes over Leonetti, with another Rural grad, Hayden Beck, finishing third.
"I felt pretty good,'' Alonzo said. "I knew if I just kept everything the same and just chilled out and made sure everything I was supposed to do was right I knew I'd be just fine.
"I was pretty consistent. I had a few bogeys out there but then I got a few lucky shots, with a chip-in for eagle.''
Topeka West product Myles Alonzo shot a 68 on Monday to pull away for a nine-stroke victory in the TGA City Stroke Play championship. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Myles Alonzo claimed his first TGA City Stroke Play title Monday at Topeka Country Club with a 54-hole score of 205. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Alonzo, who will play college golf at Fort Hays State, finished with a 54-hole total of 205 (68-69-68) while Leonetti, who plays at Missouri-Kansas City, finished at 214 (70-67-77), two strokes ahead of Beck, a Washburn University golfer (75-70-71).
Former Washburn Rural standout Luke Leonetti finished second in Monday's City Stroke Play tournament at Topeka Country Club. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Washburn Rural graduate and current Washburn University golfer Hayden Beck finished third in the TGA City Stroke Play tournament Monday at Topeka Country Club. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Patrick Golden finished fourth (217) while Stuckey-Halley, 2023 champion Brian Walker and Jeremiah Nelson tied for fifth place at 218.
Nelson was one of two golfers who carded holes in one on Monday, with Jeremiah Nelson acing the No. 6 hole and Aaron Rethman acing the 11th hole.
Alonzo's championship came after older brother Addison won the Stroke Play crown in 2022.
"I'm going to try a little bit better than him,'' the 18-year-old Myles cracked. "I'm going to try to beat him (with more titles).''
TGA CITY STROKE PLAY TOURNAMENT
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
For the record, the No. 1 men's spot on TopSports.news' list of the Top 100 Athletes in Shawnee County history wasn't decided by a coin flip ... but it was briefly considered.
Picking the top spot, and really the entire Top 10, was that tough of a task.
Topeka High baseball legend Mike Torrez and former Shawnee Heights basketball and golf star Gary Woodland, the 2019 U.S. Open champion, had both been selected No. 1 in previous Top 100 projects and were both worthy candidates this time around as were several other nationally and world-renowned local greats.
In the end Torrez, a World Series champion and 20-game winner over an 18-year year Major League career, got the nod by the slightest of margins over Woodland, a two-time state basketball champ for the T-Birds and a four-time winner on the PGA Tour.
Former American League All-Star and two-time Gold Glove winner Ken Berry holds down the No. 3 position on the TSN list followed by two-time Olympic wrestler Melvin Douglas and Silver Lake and Kansas State basketball icon Lon Krugeer.
The second five on the Top 10 include PBA Hall of Famer Chris Barnes, Olympic long-jumper Preston Carrington (Syed Abdul-Mutfi), former NFL veterans and Super Bowl participants Troy Wilson and Tom Dinkel, and two-time state high school and NAIA national basketball champion Tom Meier.
All of the Top 10 honorees are members of the Topeka Shawnee County Sports Hall of Fame.
TSN SHAWNEE COUNTY ALL-TIME TOP 100 MEN’S ATHLETES
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
The most impressive thing about NiJaree Canady is that she still may have not hit her peak just two college seasons into an already prolific softball career.
But the former two-time state champion at Topeka High, college freshman of the year and national player of the year for Stanford and future Texas Tech Red Raider has already accomplished enough to get the nod for the No. 1 spot on TopSports.news' list of the Top 100 Athletes in Shawnee County history.
Canady, who also helped lead Topeka High to three straight Class 6A state berths in basketball, headlines a top five that that also includes Olympic silver medalist Margaret Murdock, former NCAA national softball champion Lisa Carey, current Kentucky and USA Volleyball Under 21 star Brooklyn DeLeye and multi-time state champ, Arizona State All-American and pro tennis player Sheri Norris.
Former Cair Paravel Latin star Peyton Williams, an All-Big-12 honoree in basketball and volleyball for Kansas State, earned the No. 6 spot on the Top 100, followed by K-State hoops star Nadira Hazim, Washburn University record-setter Brenda Shaffer-Dahl, Iowa State volleyball star Kaylee Manns and Nebraska national volleyball champ Jazz Sweet.
TSN SHAWNEE COUNTY ALL-TIME TOP 100 WOMEN’S ATHLETES
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Seven Topeka Shawnee County Sports Hall of Famers, two current NFL players who continue to add to their legacy, and a baseball great who made his mark more than a century ago comprise men's picks No. 11 through 20 on TopSports.news' list of the Top 100 Athletes in Shawnee County history.
The late Fred Slaughter and Steve Tilford, who graduated from Topeka High, Highland Park's Michael Wilhoite, Kyle Weems and James Patrick, Washburn Rural's Aaron Crow and Topeka West's Warren Seitz are all members of the Topeka Shawnee County shrine while former Topeka High star Teven Jenkins and Shawnee Heights/Washburn University great Corey Ballentine have carved out successful NFL careers and the late Elwood "Bingo'' DeMoss made his professional baseball debut in 1905 before going on to an outstanding career in the Negro Leagues as a player and a manager.
Slaughter played on the legendary John Wooden's first national basketball championship team at UCLA, while Tilford was a world renowned cyclist.
Wilhoite put together a seven-year NFL career, including a Super Bowl appearance, while Weems helped lead Highland Park to a perfect 25-0 season basketball season before starring at Missouri State and embarking on a long and continuing professional career while Patrick helped the Scots capture the only Grand State championship in Kansas history.
Crow was an All-American at Missouri and an American League All-Star for the Kansas City Royals while Seitz was a multi-sport standout at Topeka West, quarterbacked the Missouri Tigers and had a stint in the NFL.
TSN SHAWNEE COUNTY ALL-TIME TOP 100 MEN’S ATHLETES
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Topeka High product NiJaree Canady, the 2024 USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year as a sophomore at Stanford, announced Wdnesday afternoon that she is transferring to Texas Tech out of the transfer portal.
College softball player of the year NiJaree Canady, a former two-sport star at Topeka High, announced Wednesday that she is transferring to Texas Tech. [Stanford Athletics]
Canady, a multi-time All-State softball and basketball honoree at Topeka High, will join the Red Raiders, a member of the Big 12, with two years of college elibibility remaining.
Canady announced her commitment on X (formerly Twitter) and ESPN reported that Canady, a right-handed pitcher, has agreed to a record-breaking name, image and likeness deal.
Canady entered the transfer portal last month after leading Stanford to back-to-back Women's College World Series appearances in 2023 and 2024.
As a sophomore Canady posted a 24-7 pitching record while leading the nation with a 0.73 earned run average and 337 strikeouts.
Canady, who was named the national freshman of the year in her first season at Stanford, compiled an 0.67 earned run average over her two seasons with the Cardinal, posting 555 strikeouts in 365⅔ innings.
