Fenwick freshman Stephanie Mroz looks like real deal on the links

Fenwick freshman Stephanie Mroz shot the first hole in one of her life Sept. 29, but never saw her ball drop into the cup.

Mroz only reacted after her playing partners began jumping up and down with excitement. She used a pitching wedge to ace the 90-yard par-3 No. 13 hole at Village Greens of Woodridge.

It led to a special day for Mroz, who went on to shoot a 9-over-par 81 for medalist honors at the East Suburban Catholic meet.

The reason she never saw her ball disappear was because Mroz had taken off her glasses. They were giving her problems when Mroz four-putt a sloping green at No. 16 and then shanked her iron shot off the No. 17 tee into heavy prairie grass down the right side.

She said the frames on her glasses were distracting her. Mroz is considering switching to contact lens after the season. She said despite being near-sighted, she was thinking about not wearing her glasses for Wednesday’s scheduled Class AA St. Ignatius Regional at Cog Hill No. 1.

She only realized she needed glasses after arriving at Fenwick, when she sat in the back of the classroom and could not see the whiteboard.

“I’ve tried to keep my glasses on, but I feel like I play worse,” Mroz said. “I’m accustomed to not wearing them.”

On the course, Mroz tries to adjust to not wearing glasses. While reading greens, she imagines the hole is a foot bigger than it actually is. She also uses a Callaway range finder before every shot to measure yardages. She played a practice round without her glasses Sunday at Cog Hill.

When junior Frankie Bell learned during the offseason that Mroz was going to attend Fenwick, Bell began following her future teammate on the Illinois Junior Golf Association website.

The Wood Dale resident won the circuit’s Junior Girls Division championship and ended the summer by winning the Player of the Year Championship. She won seven tournaments overall.

Both Mroz and Bell belong to The Players Series, a golf training program.

“She absolutely motivates me to work harder, especially now that we are on the same team practicing together all the time,” Bell said. “There is no doubt she has a bright future and will carry it through to the Fenwick girls golf team.”

Given Mroz’s success over the summer, Fenwick coach Joseph Konrad has appreciated Mroz’s humble attitude among her teammates. She is the only freshman on the varsity team.

“Her attitude, which is carefree, that in turn does not allow her to put any more pressure on herself, much less being a freshman than a senior,” Konrad said. “Stephanie does not have that ‘I am better than the rest of the girls attitude.’ She respects all the older girls and plain-out has fun with them.”