Jamesville-DeWitt girls golfer Molly Hair was accustomed to the pressure of playing in the New York State Public High School Athletic Association tournament on SUNY-Delhi’s course, while her teammate, Junghye Kim, was new to all this.
But during last weekend’s state tournament, each of them would beat most of the field of 81 that ventured to Delhi, and the Section III team, fueled by Auburn’s Lindsay May and her inspired run to the individual state title, earned first place in the team standings for the first time.
For Hair, her return to the state tournament commenced with a front-nine 45, one shot worse than Kim, which did not feature a birdie. But she matched Kim’s 39 on the back nine, managing a birdie on the short, 125-yard par-three 12th, to finish at 84.
During Sunday’s final round, Hair would improve as much as anyone in the field. Teeing off on the 6th hole (the field had a shotgun start), Hair would never make worse than a bogey on this day.
With birdie on the par-five 18th and on her last hole, the par-four 5th, Hair offset eight bogeys and finished with an 78, six over par and six shots better than her work on Saturday. That put her at 161 and a tie for 16th place.
Kim began on the 10th hole Saturday morning with a double bogey, but played the next six holes in one under par, including a birdie on 15, before turning in 39. Her front nine included double bogeys on 3 and 5, and returning in 44, she finished at 83.
This put Kim in a tie for 23rd place, but just nine shots back of co-leaders Chelsea Dantonio (Section VI) and Emily Doyle (Section IV), who led with two-over-par 74. Auburn’s Larissa Carter, the two-time Section III individual champion, was one shot off the lead following a first-round 75, with Carter’s Maroons teammate, Lindsay May, three shots back at 77.
Kim got off to a tremendous start in the final round (which started on the 6th hole), going one under par over her first nine holes to move into the top 10 on the leaderboard. But she would struggle the rest of the way, hurt most by a nine on the par-four 4th hole, her next-to-last hole of the round.
That led to an 82, and the two-day total of 165, four shots worse than Hair and tied for 30th overall. But it helped Section III to earn the team championship.
May was two over through four holes (she started on the 2nd hole), but then played the remaining 14 holes in five under part with four birdies, an eagle on the par-five 9th and just one bogey.
Shooting a three-under-par 69 (a course and Section III record for the tournament), May finished at 146, two over par, three shots ahead of Dantonio, to earn the state individual title.
Carter shared eighth place, with 156, with New Hartford seventh-grader Sydney Bard tied for 14th (160), Baldwinsville’s Katie Walsh tied for 30th (158) and Cicero-North Syracuse’s Brianna Sovring tied for 44th (178), followed by two more Auburn players, Kaitlyn Hlywa (185) and Alayna Slayton (189).
