After having its season significantly shortened by snow, the Cardinal golf team kicked off the spring campaign two weekends ago at the Trinity Invitational. The tournament took place in Newington, CT, at the Indian Hills Country Club.
Wes competed alongside fellow Little Three foe Amherst, as well as interstate rival Trinity’s “A” and “B” squads.
Atreya Sinha ’17 led the Birds on the green, driving with consistency en route to a 79 on day one and an 80 on day two for a total of 159. Sinha finished tied for fifth out of 24 competitors. Paul Andrick ’16 followed seven shots behind Sinha, shooting an 82 on the front end of the tournament and an 84 on the final leg, good enough for a 166 and a tie for twelfth place.
Wesleyan’s only senior in the competition, Nikhil Lai, posted scores of 88 and 91 for each day, totaling 179 for 21st place overall. Colin O’Keeffe ’17 followed just two shots behind Lai, shooting an 87 on the first day, but added seven strokes on his second day performance for a finish of 181. Emmet Daly ’18 and Andrew Rachlin ’18 rounded out the Cardinals’ scores, shooting 94 and 92, and 99 and 97, for scores of 186 and 196 respectively, putting the two in 23rd and 24th place.
Nick Buenaventura of Trinity’s “A” team won the tournament, shooting a 76 and a 77 for a total of 153. George Bell of Trinity’s “B” squad led the leaderboard after the first day, posting a 74, but fell off the pace on the final day, shooting an 82. He finished in fourth place. Trinity’s “A” team nabbed the top three spots, with its “B” team taking the rest of the positions in the top-five, excluding Sinha. Amherst’s highest finisher was James Line in eighth place, as he posted a 160, scoring a 78 on day one and an 82 on day two.
The Bantams’ “A” team finished with a cumulative score of 621, their “B” team entered the clubhouse with a score of 641, the Lord Jeffs were 14 strokes back at 655, and the Cardinals finished 30 strokes behind that at 685.
The Cardinals ended their spring season on Wednesday, April 29, at the Little Three tournament against Amherst and Williams on Wesleyan’s home greens at the Lyman Orchards Golf Course in Middlefield, Conn.
Pairing up into teams for two-man alternating-shot match play, Andrick and Sinha beat their Lord Jeffs counterparts, three and two. This means that they were up by three shots with two holes remaining, and since you can only receive one point per hole, the match was decided in Wesleyan’s favor. The duo proceeded to lose a very close match to Williams by a score of 1-down. Lai and Jesse Warren ’15 lost seven and five against Amherst and seven and six against Williams.
Colin O’Keeffe ’17 and Jared Fineberg ’17 lost to the Purple and White seven and five. Against the Purple and Gold, they were a slightly closer, falling five and four. Brothers Alex Rachlin ’15 and Andrew Rachlin ’18, lost to Williams five and four and were defeated by the Lord Jeffs four and three.
Wes would get its second point against Amherst with Sinha winning three and two in singles play. Sinha could not continue his singles success against his Williams opponent, and he was defeated six and five. The last point for the Cardinals came from O’Keeffe, who won a 2-up decision against his opponent from Amherst.
Overall, the team finished 3-9 against Amherst and was shut out by Williams. The Ephs took care of the Lord Jeffs, 8.5 to 3.5 to earn the overall Little Three Title. Last season, the Cardinals were also shutout by the Ephs, but fell to Amherst, 2-10.
The Cardinals will look to get stronger in the off-season, slowly getting closer and closer to the top teams in the NESCAC.