Carroll golfer Keira Ronsick shares bond with father, a former K-State football player
The golf career of Keira Ronsick began as a curiosity, continued as a way to develop a special bond with her father and has now led to arguably the greatest high school career for a girls golfer at Bishop Carroll.
Ronsick is hoping to add to her story in her final Class 5A state tournament, a 2-day event that begins Monday at Hesston Golf Course. She has finished in the top-15 of her first three state tournaments, but plans to improve on her career-best finish of ninth from last season.
“I just want to play my best golf,” Ronsick said. “I want to be able to look back and not have any regrets with a single shot or how I played on a certain hole. I just want to know that I put my best game out there and hope for the best.”
Ronsick has worked her way to among the best in Kansas without a swing coach or a golf pro, rather her father, Mike, teaching her.
Ever since she was little and remembered going to her grandfather’s home in Colwich, where a putting green had been installed in the backyard, Ronsick has always learned the game from her father.
“I was just looking for a way to spend more time with him,” Ronsick said of her father. “I asked if I could try golf out and that’s how it all started.”
Mike Ronsick was more than happy to share the passion for golf, which he picked up following his career as a punter on the Kansas State football team from 1998-01.
He found that his past career helped him become a teacher in his new favorite sport.
“It’s actually pretty interesting how much kicking relates to golf as far as training the movements and using your momentum,” Mike Ronsick said. “I’ve used that a lot to try to guide her and how to develop her mechanics.”
Another way that her father’s football career has helped Keira has been discussing ways to handle pressure in golf tournaments.
“He knows how to deal with pressure because he would be punting with the game on the line a lot, so he knows how to handle those big pressure moments,” Keira Ronsick said. “He has really helped me work through pressure in my tournaments.”
“What impresses me the most is that if you’re around Keira at home, you would think she is this shy girl,” Mike Ronsick said. “But when she gets up there at the tee for a tournament, she just turns it on and the nerves disappear. She has the tendency of showing up when she needs to.”
With a scoring average of 75 strokes this season, Keira, who has verbally committed to Newman, has already cemented a career that Carroll coach Mark Berger believes is the best yet. She added another impressive chapter earlier this week by tying for first place at the regional tournament with a round of 71 in Emporia.
The success has been built on her consistency.
“She just doesn’t really have a weakness to her game,” Berger said. “Her distance off the tee is plenty good, her short game is solid, she’s pretty much automatic from short distance on the green. She knows what to do when she gets into trouble, although she hardly gets in trouble.
“When she has a bad round, she shoots 76. I wish I could have a bad round where I shoot 76.”
Regardless of how her final state tournament plays out, Keira appreciates what the game of golf has done for her: a scholarship to play in college and a special bond with her father.
“I love learning how to beat my dad now,” Keira said. “Sports have definitely brought us closer over the years. It makes our practice time together a lot more personable than it would be with a swing coach or somebody else. It’s just really special.”
Kansas high school girls golf state tournament schedule
Dates: Oct. 17-18
Class 6A—Salina Municipal Golf Course
Class 5A—Hesston Golf Course
Class 4A—Emporia Municipal Golf Course
Class 3-1A—Carey Park in Hutchinson
This story was originally published October 13, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
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