One absolute truth about the Baldwinsville boys golf team in 2015 was that it had more quality players on hand than in many different past seasons.
In all, the Bees sent eight golfers to Arrowhead Golf Course for Wednesday’s Section III Class AA championships, and they all shot 90 or better, though only Matt Monaco was able to advance to the May sectional state qualifier at Colgate University’s Seven Oaks.
Monaco knows this path well. He took the same route in the 2014-15 season, qualifying in the sectional Class AA tournament, and then advancing from Seven Oaks to the state championships at Cornell University, where he helped the Section III All-Stars win the team portion of the state championships.
Now, facing tough greens at Arrowhead that caused even the best players in the field to three and four-putt, Monaco avoided most of the big numbers and shot a seven-over-par 79, which was enough to advance, since it took an 82 to reach the top 30 in the 118-player field.
All of the B’ville golfers got close to that total. Eion Tierney led them, posting an 85, while Ben Donohue and Ryan Fecco each shot 86. Zach Ravas and Connor Hayes were steady, too, both finishing at 87 as Tim Garraffo earned an 89 and Maxwell Dec finished with a 90.
Since Monaco, Tierney, Donohue, Fecco and Garraffo made up the team scores, B’ville had a total of 425. That put them behind the ultra-close battle for the Class AA team championship as West Genesee, with a 404, edged Auburn (405) by a single shot and Cicero-North Syracuse Blue (406) by two shots for its first sectional team title since 2010.
Individually, the championship went to C-NS Blue’s Pat O’Donnell, who posted an early 73 and saw no one else match it. That was six shots ahead of Monaco and two ahead of the runners-up, Auburn’s Mike May and West Genesee’s Sean Stanistreet.
