It’s June. The Maine Amateur Championship looms. And this week and last marked the chance for golfers to crack the field by playing well in the qualifier tournaments.

That means pressure. No matter how many times a golfer goes through it.

“I think most golfers get nerves on the first tee if you’re playing a little two-dollar Nassau with your buddies,” said Lakewood Golf Course’s Heath Cowan, who’s played in qualifiers over 20 times since 1995. “I think it’s because you care. If you didn’t care what the outcome was, you wouldn’t be nervous.”

Two of the qualifiers, one at Willowdale Golf Course in Scarborough and another at Brunswick Golf Club, were held last week, with a total of 41 players shooting 78 or better earning a spot in the Maine Am, which starts July 7 at Biddeford-Saco Country Club. Two more, one at Poland Spring Golf Course on Tuesday and a final one at Bangor Municipal Golf Course on Thursday, will round out the field.

Many of the players attempting to qualify are like Cowan, tournament regulars for whom the Am is an annual endeavor. For others, like Springbrook Golf Club’s Zander Cook, it’s a new experience. The former varsity player at Maranacook hasn’t played competitively since high school, and he said he expects to feel some butterflies before he tees off Tuesday at 9:30 in Poland.

“It should be interesting,” Cook said. “There’s definitely some nerves, so that’s exciting. I think that makes golf fun, is when you’re out there and you’ve got pressure situations to be in.”

Cook said he didn’t give the Am much serious thought until a friend, Stephen Holt, moved back from Maine and persuaded him to give it a shot. Holt qualified with a 76 at Brunswick.

“It wasn’t really on my radar,” he said. “(He said) long term that it will increase your game, it will help you become a better player. And I’ve even found myself taking the game more seriously in my practice rounds and rounds with friends.”

Cook said he’s not putting any extra pressure on himself.

“For me, I don’t have expectations, so that kind of helps,” he said. “(I’m) going in with an open mind and a clear slate. If I don’t make the cut, I’m not going to have any hard feelings and I won’t be too let down. And if I do, it’s great. It’s exciting, and I’m looking forward to being around a bunch of guys that have that competitive spirit.”

While Cowan said he still feels the anxiousness of a first-year player, he’s seen the advantage that comes with experience.

“I think the older you get, the more that you’ve done it, whether it’s golf or whatever, you get nervous but it goes away quicker,” said Cowan, who qualified for last year’s Am at Portland Country Club and plays Thursday in Bangor. “When you’re doing it for the first time … that sense of nervousness stays with you for a lot longer in the round. Now you get nervous on that first tee, maybe make that first putt or miss that first putt, and then the nerves kind of go away.”

Cowan said the qualifiers can have the same tense atmosphere that the Maine Am does, and that he’s looking forward to playing under those circumstances again.

“It’s just fun to go out and see these guys that can bomb it, and you want to be involved in that competition,” he said. “You want to feel that adrenaline rush. … It’s 100 percent to go and compete and prove to yourself you can still play the game you grew up loving.”

 

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The Maine State Golf Association announced the golfers that received awards from the MSGA Scholarship Fund, and the central Maine area was represented well on the list.

Oakland’s Dylan Cunningham, a Messalonskee High School graduate, won the Charlie Shuman Award, South China’s Conner Paine won the Davis Richardson Award, and Augusta’s Mitchell Tarrio, a Kents Hill School graduate, won the Winchenbach Award.

The other MSGA scholars are Windham’s Evan Glicos and Zachary Loftis, Cumberland’s Rachel Smith and Lincoln’s Logan Thompson and Max Woodman. The MSGA also announced that the Frank Langlois Scholarship was awarded to Bar Harbor’s Gabrielle James and Topsham’s Caleb Manuel.

The 10 scholarships award a total of $59,000 over four years, MSGA executive director Brian Bickford said.

 

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Since golf returned at the start of May, courses across the state are seeing busy days from sunrise to sunset.

“A lot of the courses are seeing anywhere from 30 to 50 percent more play,” MSGA executive director Brian Bickford said. “One course in southern Maine said their May rounds were like August last year. When you say May rounds are better than August, that’s like saying May skiing is better than January.”

Bickford said the golfers have been younger than usual, and they’ve been playing more often. Late weekday afternoons, normally a dead period, have been busy as well.

“We’re seeing younger, and … I think with no Little League, you’re getting some of the dads, and I’m seeing a lot of couples on the courses,” he said. “You’re working at home, you want to go do something outside. What can you do? Oh, let’s play golf.”

There have been more kids playing as well.

“There are courses that have seen huge junior play, and I think part of it is when kids are home-schooled, they might be done by 9:30, 10 in the morning,” Bickford said. “What are they going to do the rest of the day? If they were kind of a baseball player or on the edge of wanting to play golf or their buddy was going to play golf, then they’re signing up and playing golf.”

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