The girls’ golf team competed Oct. 17 at regionals with junior Alex Vasquez, freshman Rachel Manfreda, and junior Skyler Kipp placing 27th, 55th, and 56th respectively.

During regionals, the weather was not on the side of the golfers, as it was cold and windy. Manfreda teed off first at around 9 a.m.

“I was pretty confident, but I doubted myself a little bit because of the weather that we were playing in,”  Vasquez said.

The regional competition was played at the Landfall course in Wilmington, which is known to be difficult to play on.

Golf coach Jennifer Niemeier respects the course and notes the difficult conditions that day, but is proud of her team’s resilience.

“Not only is it a hard course to play on, our girls’ teed off first thing in the morning. It was 50 degrees with 15 mph winds. We did not have the weather on our side at all,” Niemeier said. “By midday, the winds calmed down, and it was a perfect day, but our girls were finishing up. The girls stayed strong with the mental aspect, which is tough for golf, you have a rough hole it can be hard to fight back. The girls did a great job with keeping their heads up and playing.”

The weather wasn’t the only challenge of the course. The first nine holes of the course also present challenges for the golfers.

“It was really hilly and the greens were much faster than I had been used to, and it was hard to get used to that,” Manfreda said.

Despite the challenges, the golfers were able to adapt and continue the course. They were especially happy with their putting on the first 9 holes.

“I had some good long putts, and I’ve just been working really hard on that,” Kipp said.

“I made a 15-20 foot putt I was really proud of after a bad hole,” Manfreda said.

The back 9 holes also present difficulties for the golfers. 

“On the back nine, definitely hills took a big part of it, with bunkers as well throughout the course  that got a lot of the girls, including me,” Vasquez said.“If you miss the green, then you’d get it, and the ball would just roll down the hill and then you would have to hit it uphill and that would just take an extra stroke that you really didn’t need.”

Despite the undesired weather and many challenges of the course, the golfers were able to reflect on their performance and learn from their play. While none of the girls qualified for states, the golfers were still able to have a positive experience. 

”I left regionals proud of my swing, as all the accomplishments returned throughout the season. I would practice every day and go out and focus on regionals,” Vasquez said. “It sucks that I didn’t make states, but I was super close, and I’m just happy that I was able to do better than the year before, and I was able to just at least beat the girls that I was playing with.”