Sweet Home finished its golf season May 11-12 at the District 2 playoffs, which combined the Sky-Em and the Oregon West conferences, placing fifth out of nine teams.
Coach Pat Davis said the Huskies were a little disappointed with that finish because they carded a 398 on the first day at Tokatee, outside of Blue River.
Considering that their previous two scores at Tokatee this season had been 470 and 431, “398 was pretty exciting.”
He said their goal had been to break 400.
Senior Brenner Roberts led the Huskies with an 85, which tied him for second at the end of Day 1.
Day 2 was a different story, Davis said. The Huskies shot 421.
“We didn’t play real well.”
Roberts was still in contention for an individual spot in the state playoffs through the front nine, but he shot 17 over on the back nine and wound up 10th. Individuals who aren’t already on one of the three qualifying teams have to finish in the top seven to make state.
“We were disappointed, he was disappointed. He had nine bad holes,” Davis said.
Cottage Grove won the the district title, shooting 359-373-732, led by senior Johnny Conrad, who was the individual champion, shooting 78-79-157 and tournament runner-up Cameron Sandoval with an 87-84-171. Also qualifying for state were Junction City (369-363-732) and Stayton (374-373-747).
One bright spot for Sweet Home was that they had been sixth nearly all year, and in the final tournament finished one notch higher.
The Huskies have three freshmen expected back next year and two returning varsity players, senior-to-be Tyler Plebuch who was the No. 2 man for most of the season, and junior-to-be Dawson Guzman.
“We’ll still be young and raw, but overall I think we’ll be slightly better than this year,” Davis said. “If the three freshmen play enough during the off-season, we’ll at least be deeper than this year.”
Also competing at district were freshman girls Haley May and Alayna Davis, who competed in the District 2 girls tournament at Santiam Golf Club in Stayton.
May medaled, after shooting a 98 on Day 1 – 55 on the front and 43 on the back. She finished the second day with a 106, but that still put her in the top 10, Pat Davis said.
Alayna Davis finished in the top one-third, he said, in the field of 50-plus girls, shooting 116 both days.
“We want to get more female athletes next year so we can field a team,” Pat Davis said. “This year, all the meets, they played with guys. When they got to districts, it was a much different world.
“We just need two more so we can put a full team out there.”