Throughout the last four years, the one constant on Baldwinsville’s girls golf team has been the excellent work done by Katie Walsh.
Now, as a senior, Walsh gets to make one more trip to SUNY-Delhi to compete in the New York State Public High School Athletic Association championship tournament – and she’ll do so after the Bees’ Matt Monaco makes an appearance in the boys state golf tournament in Ithaca.
Walsh’s third state tournament berth was earned last Tuesday at Oneida’s Kanon Valley Country Club, where the Section III championships were again held, with Monaco surviving a playoff to make it out of the boys sectional state qualifier at Seven Oaks in Hamilton.
Everyone in the field had to contend with a Kanon Valley course soaked by an inch of overnight rain. Still, they played in mostly dry conditions until a noontime downpour caught the late finishers and left standing water on some of the greens.
That made it difficult to put up low scores – but Auburn’s Lindsay May did so, anyway, the reigning state champion posting a 78 to beat her teammate, Maggie Lesch (85), by seven shots to grab the individual sectional title.
Not far behind them, Walsh was steady and relentless, shooting a 44 on the front nine and a 42 on the back nine, and her total of 86 left her tied with New Hartford’s Sydney Bard for third place
Walsh, Bard, May and Lesch are joined on Section III’s state team by Jamesville-DeWitt teammates Jung-Hye Kim and Maggie Bonomo, plus Westhill’s Julia Miesner, Vernon-Verona-Sherrill’s Olivia Evans and Cicero-North Syracuse’s Nessa McKie, who beat Fayetteville-Manlius’ Maggie Bonomo in a two-hole playoff for the final spot.
B’ville finished with a team total of 433, good for seventh place in Division I as Auburn (368) held off New Hartford (376) for a third straight sectional title. Megan Foriero finished with a 107, while Jordyn Fofi finished with a 114 and Emma Brushingham, caught in the downpour, had a 126.
On Thursday, Monaco joined by Eion Tierney and Carson Hayes started play in their Section III state qualifier at Seven Oaks in Hamilton, having earned those spots back in October at the end of the CNY Counties League regular season.
Hayes struggled to a 104 and Tierney had a 98, missing the first-day cut. But Monaco, by shooting a strong 78, tied for fifth place, just four shots behind the leader, Auburn’s Mike May, and made it to Saturday’s final round.
May shot a two-under-par 70 to pull away for the title, but the real drama was with Monaco, who managed to shoot an 85. That put him at 163, in a tie for the ninth and final state tournament berth with Dylan Plis (West Genesee), Sean Dain (Oswego) and Ryan Keller (Fayetteville-Manlius).
A playoff followed, and Monaco won it, earning a place alongside May, Alex Kunzwiler (Oswego), Dante Migliore (Frankfort-Schuyler), Jack Bellardini (CBA), Bobby Davenport (West Canada Valley) and three New Hartford golfers – Tom Mandel, Alec Bard and Matt Dreimiller – who advanced to this weekend’s state tournament held at Cornell University’s course.
