Bio

Tyler Loop – in his 11th year coaching golf for McCook Community College – is coming off a record-setting season with MCC finishing 16th in the National Junior College Athletic Association National Tournament in May at the Sand Creek Golf Course at Newton, Kan. This was the school’s best-ever finish in the national tournament.

2023 was also the fifth time in the past six years that MCC qualified for the national tournament. The only time the team didn’t qualify was in 2020 when the tournament was cancelled because of the coronavirus.

The team claimed its first ever West District Championship in 2023, one of four schools in the nation to claim district titles. District champions are determined by spring scoring statistics. The West District includes the six teams in MCC’s region (Region IX) and three schools in Region I of Arizona.

MCC ranked 13th in the final regular-season Division I NJCAA Men’s Golf Rankings, also the team’s best showing ever in the polls.

The golf team won the Region IX championship for the third time in school history and won their last eight regular-season tournaments. Coach Loop was named the Region IX Coach of the Year. Sophomore Ethan Gough (Pietermaritzburg, South Africa) and freshman Cade Cryer (Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) were named to the Region IX first team, while sophomores Brayden Dahl (Outer West Durban, South Africa) and Cayden Wynne (Lincoln) were named to the second team.

The team set six other school records this season including:

• Lowest two-day total: -9 (Sterling, Colo, April 12-13 and Torrington, Wyo. April 26-27 – the final two regular season tournaments)
• Lowest one-day total -12 (Sterling, Colo., Sept. 22, 2022)
• Most tournaments won: 12 – including all eight spring tournaments and nine overall
• Largest margin of victory: 46 strokes over two days (April 6-7, McCook, Heritage Hills)
• Scoring average: 289 over 30 rounds of golf played. (A combined -27 under par in the team’s final seven rounds of the season)

For individual honors, Ethan Gough posted the lowest one-day score, shooting a seven-under 65 in the fall Northeastern Junior College tournament at Sterling, Colo. He also posted the lowest two-day score with his -8 in April at Heritage Hills under strong wind conditions. He recorded the school’s lowest scoring average. He finished the regular season as the 13th ranked player in Division 1 with the second lowest scoring average of 69.7.

In May, Gough became the first MCC golfer to be named to the NJCAA Division I PING All-American and All-District Team. Only five golfers in the nation received first-team all-American status. He finished in 24th place in the national tournament, also the best finish ever for any MCC golfer.

Dahl, Wynne and Cryer were all selected to the all-West District Team.

Four sophomores are moving on. Gough will golf for Barry University, an NCAA division II school in Miami Shores, Fla.; Dahl is going to George Mason University, a division 1 program. Wishon and Wynne are staying in Nebraska to continue their careers at NAIA schools. Wishon signed on with Midland University and Wynne will golf at Bellevue University.

Academically, the team compiled a 3.13 GPA earlier this spring and earned NJCAA Academic Teams of the year status for the second straight year. The team was named MCC’s academic team of the year in 2022.

In 2020 under Loop, MCC was named the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) top academic golf team in the nation compiling a 3.67 grade-point average. The Indians had the top academic scores from among 180 junior college golf programs across the nation.

Loop is a native of McCook and a former MCC golfer himself. He and his wife Tyler Sue have three children, Kapri, Keaton, and Amity.