Jason Dowdy moved from interested dad to golf coach this year for the Checotah Wildcats which brought on an interesting challenge as we’ll discuss later. The boys’ team was led by senior Carter Stewart who was the #1 bag for the team and will play at Northeastern State next year.

“Team-wise he gave us a lot of opportunities with his play,” said Dowdy. “We finished third at Roland, first at Stigler and fifth in the regionals behind some good teams that all went to state. We didn’t play as well at regionals as I thought we were capable of. We kind of lost our bearings a bit but most of these guys are pretty young and relatively inexperienced and not used to that kind of pressure. Although he didn’t do as well at state as he would have liked (finishing 13^th), I still think Carter is probably one of the top players in the state.”

Stewart’s finish at the state tournament earned the 2023 graduate All-State honors.

Other players on the boy’s team for the Wildcats included brothers Jackson and Weston Brown, Aum Patel and AJ Tabb, all of whom also played basketball for Dowdy.

“Jackson was a senior who was our #2 bag and played consistently throughout the year. Aum is a sophomore who improved steadily over the season. Weston was our #5 bag and he just missed getting into the 80s, which is pretty good for a freshman. Weston, Aum and AJ live on the golf course, I think. Carter was a great role model for these younger kids who haven’t played nearly as long as he has. They learned a lot by watching him get out of a jam or benefitting from his hands-on help on certain shots or how to hit a certain club different ways to get results.”

The previously mentioned challenge for Dowdy this year came on the girl’s side where he was coaching his oldest daughter, Haedyn.

“Coaching your own kid was a little tougher than I expected, maybe even more so for her,” said the father/coach. “She was used to getting constructive criticism at home from dad but not so much out on the course from the coach. That wasn’t helped by the fact that last year I was just an interested dad who went to all her meets and was there with her from start to finish but this year I now have to split my time among the rest of the girls on the team and I think she resented that a little and I had to point out to her that out here I’m your coach, not your dad and I think there were times that she was the first one I had to threaten to kick off the team,” laughed Dowdy. “But at the end of the day we’d go home and iron things out and I think I learned some things that I’ll have to do differently next year.”

Other girls on the team were senior Allison Teague who was the #1 bag, junior Maci Britt the #2 bag, Savanna Brown, Blaze Roper, and Rilee Sisson.