John Marshall, Wheeling Central Crowned In Final Day Of OVAC Golf
Photo by Nick Henthorn John Marshall's OVAC 5A championship team, pictured at the Jones Course. They are Drew Marling, Hayden Harvey, Brayden Kempkens, Kamden Knapp and Rex Mallery. Head coach is Eli Lambie.
Photo Provided Wheeling Central's OVAC 3A championship team, pictured at the Crispin Course. They are , from left, Zack Zende, Andrew Potts, Rowen Parker, Luke Freeland and Isaac Tiu.
Photo by Nick Henthorn John Marshall's OVAC 5A championship team, pictured at the Jones Course. They are Drew Marling, Hayden Harvey, Brayden Kempkens, Kamden Knapp and Rex Mallery. Head coach is Eli Lambie.
Photo Provided Wheeling Central's OVAC 3A championship team, pictured at the Crispin Course. They are , from left, Zack Zende, Andrew Potts, Rowen Parker, Luke Freeland and Isaac Tiu.
Trending
WHEELING -- John Marshall won their first OVAC golf title since 2017 on Thursday in climactic fashion. The Monarchs' team total was tied with University at 329 after 18 holes at Speidel Golf Club’s Jones Course at Oglebay, and the tiebreaker was decided by who had the lower-scoring fifth man on either squad-- an advantage that went to John Marshall, and along with it, the OVAC 5A golf championship.
John Marshall reached their team score behind efforts from Hayden Harvey (81), Brayden Kempkens (82), Rex Mallery (82) and Kamden Knapp (84).
"It’s a real team," John Marshall head coach Eli Lambie said. "I mean, they’ve built such a sense of community. They get each other out on the golf course. They’re all wonderful to be around, and they all enjoy being around each other. They’ve built a culture around playing golf."
"We put together, I guess you could call them optional practices, and they show up early, they stay late, all of them are here," John Marshall assistant coach Cliff Wolodkin added. "The fact that you’ve got your number-one man becomes the tiebreaker, and two, three, four and five end up as your winning scores, that’s a true team effort if you ask me."
Sophomore Drew Marling, John Marshall's No. 1 for much of this season, and an All-Conference and All-State Tournament honoree last year as a freshman, was the Monarchs' fifth man Thursday, firing an 86-- though, in a tiebreaking situation such as Thursday's, his score ended up being vital after all. With the Monarchs and Hawks four-man team scores tied at 329, Drew Marling's 86 trumped University's fifth man, Jagger Barnes, who carded a 99.
"It was an interesting day because Drew’s had a crazy good season," Lambie said. "He’s been right around par and even under par a lot of times, and this is the first day that he struggled a bit, but the rest of the team hung in there really well and came through, so it was good to see the rest of the team come in clutch and pull it all together."
Lambie credited game management and an improved short game for his Monarchs' performances.
"We’ve been focusing a lot on short game this year," Lambie said. "At the state championship last year we struggled, especially day one, with putting and working around the greens. We’ve been out here practicing with the kids, working on the short game, working on lag putts, and then just working on some game management to keep big numbers out of play so that they keep the rounds together.
"Jones is a brutally tough golf course. It’s hard to go through unscathed just because there’s so many tough holes out there, but they did a great job, their mental games were great. They hung in there, the attitudes were really good when they hit a bad shot or had a bad hole. They picked up and went on and played really well."
While John Marshall took home the big one, no Monarchs were on the five-man All-OVAC 5A unit coming out of Thursday. Composing that team were University's Will Biddington, Bryden Rickman, and Wyatt Caplan, along with Wheeling Park's Seth Weidner and Beaver Local's Eli Stewart, who finished four strokes ahead of the next-lowest score with a 73 to earn medalist honors.
Weidner shot a 77, as did Biddington and Rickman.
After John Marshall and University's 329, Morgantown came in third with a 331, Beaver Local came in fourth with a 339, Wheeling Park came in fifth with a 344, Weir came in sixth with a 356, Warren came in seventh with a 362, Steubenville came in eighth with a 368, Brooke came in ninth with a 374, East Liverpool finished 10th with a 375, and Indian Creek came in 11th with a 381.
OVAC 3A Golf Tournament
There wasn't much drama in Thursday's OVAC 3A golf tournament, as Wheeling Central pulled away to claim their third-straight OVAC 3A golf crown on the greens at the Crispin Course at Oglebay Resort.
The title was head coach Jim Mortakis' 10th OVAC championship win.
Wheeling Central posted a team total of 304, keeping at arms-length from second-place Columbiana at a 323. Fort Frye and Shenandoah each totalled 344, with Fort Frye winning the tiebreaker to take third and Shenandoah fourth. Monroe Central came in fifth with a 379.
Wheeling Central was led on the links by Rowen Parker who carded a 75, the low-score of the day, giving the junior medalist honors for OVAC 3A. Close behind was Isaac Tiu and Luke Freeland, who each shot 76's, and Zack Zende with a 77.