On May 8 things looked fairly grim for Sweet Home’s golf teams, who had just slogged their way through a fairly forgettable first day of the district championship.
That was then.
A week later, on Monday, May 15, the Huskies had individuals in both the boys and girls state tournaments – Haley May for the girls, who stood tied for eighth after Day 1 at Trysting Tree in Corvallis, and Jake Hindmarsh, who was comfortably in the middle of the pack.
Although neither team qualified as a whole, it was a major tournaround at the district for both.
“The first day for both teams didn’t go well,” Coach Pat Davis said. “The second day, we played our best round of the year.”
The boys team of juniors Hindmarsh and Seth Wright, with freshmen Travis Thorpe, Carson Smith and Davin Guzman, moved from eighth out of eight teams to fifth.
The girls – juniors May and Alayna Davis, sophomore Nicole Grady and freshmen Brook Womack and Lexi Schilling – moved from sixth to fourth place, one slot out of qualifying as a team.
May, who shot a 96 on Day 1, moved up one position to finish third overall with a 90 on the second day. Any player not on a qualifying team who finishes in the top five gets into the state tournament as an individual.
“Every girl improved on Day 2,” Pat Davis said. “The boys improved by 46 strokes. The girls improved by 41.”
The boys’ total of 380 tied their best round of the year – and Trysting is a much more difficult course than Agate Beach, where they had posted that score earlier, Davis said.
“They just played better,” he said of both teams. “They played looser.”
Hindmarsh, who played in the final group, finished fifth after shooting an 89 to better his first-day score by three, but Davis said it wasn’t until the scores were posted that they knew he had made it.
“It was that tight,” he said.
Hindmarsh is the first Sweet Home boy to play in the state tournament since the Huskies made it as a team in 2014.
On Monday, the first day of the state tournament, May tied her lowest score of the year with a 47-40-87, and Davis said she missed some putts that easily could have put her in the low 80s.
Hindmarsh shot 45-47-92 to tie for 39th in a field of 59 players.
“He left seven or eight strokes on the course,” Davis said. “He didn’t putt particularly well. Both can bump up five-ish strokes.”
The tournments will still be in progress at Trysting when The New Era goes to press this week, so next week’s paper will report the final results.
“Haley could go mid-80s. She’s right there,” Davis said. “I’d love to see Jake in the top 25.”