This week’s notebook recaps the championship races in each of the three conferences.
By Ben Reese
There has been a changing of the guard in the Suburban One League golf standings.
In the previous two seasons, Pennsbury has won the National Conference regular season championship, Souderton has taken the Continental and Upper Dublin has captured the American.
In 2015, none of those teams finished at the top of their respective conferences. Instead, there are three new teams in first place.
North Penn has unseated Souderton in the Continental Conference. Wissaahickon has overtaken Upper Dublin in the American and Council Rock North took over for Pennsbury in the National.
North Penn tied in the standings with Central Bucks South with 12-2 records. But the Knights got the title on stroke differential.
North Penn rallied late in the season to gain the upper hand in the standings. The Knights had started the season slowly.
"I think it was just a confidence thing," said NP coach Dave DiValentino. "We had two losses early in the season but then we won both invitationals at Indian Valley and Lookaway. It just snowballed to the end."
This isn't the first conference title for the Knights. They were co-champions in 2009 but the last North Penn team to advance to the District One tournament came in 2001. Leading a deep Knights' squad were Andrew Lombardo, Ron Robinson, Joey Shibata and Matt Pickford.
"This year we had depth enough to get us to the postseason," DiValentino said. "We beat Souderton at their place which was a big win and that got us confidence going into CB South. We shot our best round of the season against them.
"Then we squeaked out (a win) against CB West. The win against CB West was our last match and it gave us our last win to get to 24 points.
"Since we beat CB South by nine shots and they beat us by five, we win the bid for the district title. It was beautiful."
Wissahickon had to wait until its final match of the season to clinch the American crown. The Trojans had beaten Upper Dublin by three strokes earlier in the season and could, at worst, lose by only two shots.
But that didn't happen. Wissahickon won the final match by four strokes to claim the title. Phil James, Noah Harrington, Greg Welsh, Matt Graeff, Thomas Clements and Jacob Kang were key players in the Trojans' title run.
"From the beginning, we thought we could do something special this year," Trojan coach John Shapcott said. "They seemed to play well on the right occasions.
"The core we have now, four juniors and four seniors playing, and all of them have two to three years experience on varsity. Experience is absolutely helping us.
"The team was very excited. They had a feeling they could pull it off and everything went our way."
Shapcott continued to emphasize his team's experience.
"Looking at the lineup coming into the year, we knew we had two or three solid players," he said. "Nothing with superstar potential -- yet.
"We knew we went eight or nine deep with players who could score for us. It kind of worked out that way all year."
Council Rock North went through a two-year hiatus from the top spot in the National Conerence. The Indians captured the title in 2012 and then battled with Pennsbury in 2013 and 2014. Both years, the Falcons emerged at the top.
Actually, Rock North had to go a bit longer to take its title. The Indians were tied with Council Rock South at 13-1 at the end of the season.
That brought in the tie-breaking methods of SOL golf. First was their record against each other, which showed North beating South once and South beating North once.
Next came their records against common opponents. Since they each were 13-1, losing only to each other, that didn't decide anything either.
The final tiebreaker was a coin flip. Buff Radick, the South athletic director and SOL golf chairman, did the flip and North was awarded the title.
"We won the toss," said Rock North coach Rich White. "I didn't know anything about who won until Buff sent me an email.
"We'll be sending five players to districts. We were sending five individuals (three boys and two girls qualified to advance to districts at the SOL Championships) but we'll have Logan (Fuglestad) with the team.
"Everything worked great. I've been very fortunate."
Fuglestad, along with Madelein Herr, Lauren Muhlbauer and Robert Scott, led this year Indian squad.
All three schools will have teams competing for a spot in the PIAA Championship. Souderton will also have a team at districts, having qualified as the wild-card team at the SOLs.
Notes from the SOL Championships: Council Rock North's Madelein Herr won the SOL girls title at LuLu Country Club. However, she looked like a different player this year.
Herr seemed to be quite deliberate standing over her ball on some shots during the SOL Championship. It was not something she had done last year.
"I've been doing that a lot lately," she said after the SOL Championship. "It's something I have to pull away from but it helps me focus.
"It's kind of a problem with pace of play but right now it's not really an issue because there's not really a pace of play to keep up."
She also has been putting cross-handed, something else new.
"I started right after states last year," she said.
She also said that she had problems putting at LuLu in the SOLs.
Pennsbury's Jordan Hughes, who qualified for District One play on the number (101), is the sister of Jasmine Hughes, who was one of the stars of the SOL.
Jasmine won the SOL title in 2005 and 2007. She finished seventh in the 2006 District One tourney and seventh in the 2006 Regionals and was 20th in the PIAA tournament in 2006 and 12th in 2007. After graduating from Pennsbury, she went on to play at Lehigh University.
Jordan, only a sophomore, will be aiming to better her sister with her first appearance at the district tournament next week.
Jack Melville of Upper Dublin is returning to the scene of some of his best golf of last year when he plays in the District One Tournament. He shot a 2-under 142 last year to finish second in the district.
"I like the course (Turtle Creek)," Melville said after the SOL Boys Championship. "You know you've got to shoot two good scores to move on so it's going to be tough."
A reminder: The District One Tournament begins Monday, Oct. 12, and continues on Tuesday, Oct. 13. The boys play both days at Turtle Creek while the girls play at Gilbertsville on Monday and then go to Turtle Creek on Tuesday for their second round. Both boys and girls tournaments will have a cut at the end of the first round.
The Eastern Regional Tournament will be held at Golden Oaks in Fleetwood on Monday, Oct. 19. The PIAA Tournament will again be at Heritage Hills in York on Monday, Oct. 26, Tuesday, Oct. 27, and Wednesday, Oct. 28.
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