Columbus golf finishes second at state after meet is shortened due to storm threat
Columbus golfers knew they weren’t shooting their best round of golf on Tuesday.
They figured they’d still get one more day to get it right.
But with two holes left to play, the Explorers found out that wouldn’t be the case.
Columbus finished the first day of the Class 3A state championship meet, held at the Mission Inn Golf Resort and Club in Howey-in-the-Hills, in second place.
The Explorers shot 301 as a team to finish four strokes behind Jupiter High.
Those results would become final when the Florida High School Athletic Association announced that the meet, which was originally scheduled to be a two-day, 36-hole event, would not have a second day of competition due to the threat of Tropical Storm Nicole affecting conditions over the next couple of days.
“The kids are super bummed out,” Columbus coach Mike Marinelli said. “It’s not every year you run into a (storm) in November. We went into the day thinking we had two days. We didn’t really know until really late in the round. It makes things different, your strategy different, if you know you have more than one day than if we had known we’d only be playing one.
“But Jupiter played better than us. They earned it.”
Columbus was trying to end a 20-year state championship drought for its program and Miami-Dade County boys’ golf teams, which haven’t won a team title since the Explorers did in 2002.
Columbus, which won the majority of the tournaments it competed in this season, felt like it had the right mix of seniors to get the job done this year.
But it wasn’t to be as only one Explorers’ golfer finished in the top 10. Senior Christian Figueredo, who is drawing interest from Barry University and other Division-II and Division-III schools, placed seventh after shooting a round of 73.
Sebastian Kawas shot 74 to place 15th while Andres Atrio and Hans Risvaer, a UCF commit, each shot 77.
The Explorers, who placed in the top three at state for the second consecutive season, graduate their top five players, but Marinelli will have a strong group of underclassmen he is counting on to keep Columbus in the mix for a state title next year.
“Coach Chris Hayes and I, we’ve built something really strong and we have a great group of sophomores that are coming up next year that have a lot of playing experience,” Marinelli said. “We should be competitive again next year. They’ve seen a lot of winning so they know what it takes.”
OTHER NOTABLES
On the girls’ side on Tuesday, Doral Academy led all South Florida teams by finishing fifth with a score of 323. The Firebirds were led by senior Gabriella Gomez, who finished in a tie for 23rd after shooting a 78. Gomez and Stoneman Douglas’ Cynthia Liu, who also shot 78, led all individual South Florida golfers. Lake Mary took home the girls’ team championship.
SCHEDULE CHANGES
▪ The Class 1A golf tournament, originally scheduled for Friday and Saturday, will also be played as a one-round, 18-hole event on Friday. The Class 2A meet is still scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday next week.
▪ Westminster Christian’s girls’ volleyball team’s Class 3A state championship match against Clearwater Central Catholic will now be played on Sunday night at 7 p.m. at Polk State College in Winter Haven. The Warriors (27-0), ranked No. 8 nationally by USA Today, are trying to become only the second team in Miami-Dade County history to go undefeated.
▪ The Classes 2A and 1A state swimming and diving championships were postponed until next Friday and Saturday, Nov. 18-19 at Sailfish Splash Waterpark and Aquatic Center in Stuart.
