Today”s column is about the fastest three months of my coaching career as well as the longest one hour of this past season. I”m basically talking about this spring”s high school golf season as well as the 13th hour of the day on Monday.
For the 25th straight spring, I coached the Kelseyville High School golf team. Prior to the start of the season, I knew I would have a pretty good team. I felt we were good enough to win our league for the second straight year and for the 12th time in school history. When practice commenced in February, I was shocked at what had occurred. My top five players were better than they had been when they last competed in the Lake County Junior in August. In fact, they were a whole lot better.
Seniors Brent Hamilton and Schuyler Bloom had played all winter long. On top of that, Brent had been taking lessons in Las Vegas while Schuyler had done the same in Los Angeles. One of the trio of sophomores, Jonathan Bridges, had pounded golf balls in his field at home all winter long. The two other sophomores, Nick Schaefer and Hipolito Perez, had played basketball for KHS, but had hit the golf course each weekend.
Kids have a way of getting immediately better in a short amount of time in golf. Bloom, Bridges, Schaefer and Perez all had handicaps of 12-15 last August, and yet by February they were all playing like a 5. Most impressive was Hamilton, who went from a 12 to a 1 and was suddenly hitting pure iron shots with just a little bit of draw.
I decided to up the ante, declaring to anyone who would listen that our 2007 team goals were to go undefeated in league and to advance out of the North Coast Section Championships and into the Tournament of Champions, something that no team in our league had ever accomplished. The top five bought into our high-level quest, continued to work hard on their games, and seemed nonplused by the added pressure I had thrown their way.
We opened the season March 7 in the pouring rain at Little River, averaged just under 79 strokes as a team, and beat the other six schools in the field handily. League began and we continued to roll, running up low scores as we won at a variety of venues, including Mount St. Helena, Bodega Harbour, Hid-den Valley Lake and Adobe Creek. We got rained out after nine holes in the San Leandro Invitational and struggled in the Lompoc Tourney, but then the team righted itself, finishing ninth out of 30 teams at the Atascadero Classic and sixth at the Rancho Cotate Invitational.
We continued to roll through league and won our final four matches at Adams Springs, Meadowwood, Windsor and Oakmont West. By then, the pressure was getting stronger and everything pointed to the May 7 sectionals at Chardonnay in Napa. Like that Chicago Bulls team that won a NBA-record 72 games in 1996, my team was aware that the league championship banner and trophy along with the undefeated season would seem incomplete if we couldn”t get out of sections and advance to the TOC.
On May 3, we went down to Chardonnay to play an afternoon practice round. The weather forecast called for rain early that evening and the sky to the west looked ominous. I paid the extra money and bought carts for all the players. We sped around the links in three hours and the rain came at 6 p.m. as we were hitting our final shots into the 18th green. My team struggled that afternoon at Chardonnay, a punitive course that has been the site for Q School, U.S. Open qualifying, and the NorCal Open. They were discouraged as we left that day, but it would turn out to be the best $280 I”ve ever spent on one of my teams.
Monday, May 7 dawned. We left the Motel 6 in Vallejo at 5:30 a.m., were on the range 30 minutes later, and headed out with the other 138 golfers for the 7 a.m. shotgun start. I marshaled a group of kids and six hours later all 144 high school golfers started coming from the far corners of the course. The first one I saw was Nick Schaefer. Standing next to NCGA rules official Jack Lucich, we could tell from a distance that he was beaming. Nick had shot a 78. Then the two sophomores, Perez and Bridges arrived. They both seemed mentally exhausted, but also had a look of total satisfaction on their faces. They too broke 80, each carding a 79. Our team score was 406, an 81 average.
The next hour took forever as the scorecards were collected and finally posted, one by one. Some coaches told me that the 406 was good enough to advance but I wasn”t sure. All those scores from Cardinal Newman and Marin Catholic and Ukiah looked awfully good and I, the always cool, calm and collected coach, was a nervous wreck. Finally, all the match was done and we were in the TOC, making it by 10 shots. In all my years of coaching, I had never gone through such a long wait. When it was over, I suddenly had the best feeling I”ve ever had as a high school golf coach. I”d waited a quarter century for this moment, and it was well worth it.
We went on to the TOC this past Monday at Shadow Lakes in Brentwood and it was a day I”ll always remember. Sure, we didn”t play as well as we wanted to. Hamilton shot a dynamic 73 and lost out on a chance to go to NorCals in a playoff. The others shot a little higher than usual and our team score of 422 averaged out to 84. Nonetheless, we were there, alongside De La Salle and Monte Vista and Foothill and all the other high school golf powerhouses. For once, I had a team that was the equal of Cardinal Newman, playing in the TOC alongside De La Salle, and on top of that exuded true class. It was the best team I ever coached and I may never repeat the experience or the feeling again.
Brent Hamilton leaves the program as the smartest, most strategic player I”ve ever had, and after his round last Monday, it is easy to admit that he had the best single season of anyone I”ve coached. He heads to a Nevada junior college and may be good enough to play Division I golf in two years. Schuyler Bloom heads off to Pepperdine University, having survived three years of me as his junior high basketball coach and four years of KHS golf. Our revolving six men, Darrin Sullivan and Wes Stevenson, are seniors too and heading off to college.
The three sophomores still have two more years ahead of them and will only get better. They are looking at a seven-man junior varsity golf team from this year to fill the spots held by the departing Hamilton and Bloom, but it won”t be easy to replace either.
As for me, I should walk away from it all while I”m on top & call it a career and let someone younger take on the travel and the fundraising and the personal expenses. After 25 years, it”s as good a time as any to give it up and get myself ready for competitive senior amateur golf. But I can”t. I really like Nick, Hipolito and Jonathan and I”m already looking forward to next year. The junior varsity guys like Kasey, Carno, Cody and Tyler should help and 2008 will be the year that freshman Liz Berry enters the program.
I guess it”s time to start reserving winter tee times for all of them.
