Mount Greylock Takes Two Wins in Opener
GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. – Will Svrluga had an inauspicious start to his high school golf season on Monday.
But he proved that sometimes it is how you finish that counts the most.
Teeing off in the second group of the first match of the Berkshire County season at Wyantenuck Country Club, Svrluga posted a nine on the 337-yard, par 4, first hole.
He finished his afternoon just seven strokes over par, posting a birdie on No. 8 and a par on the finishing hole, No. 10, to help the Mounties to a pair of wins over Mount Everett and Monument Mountain.
“I was trying to just block it out of my head,” Svrulga said of the first hole. “I was stringing together four straight pars after that, and I was just kind of like in my zone, in my zone working.
“I think other than the nine, I was two-over for the day. So I was super happy with that. It felt great.”
He felt even better after breaking par on No. 8, a 512-yard par 5 with a dogleg to the right.
“I actually put myself way out of position off the tee,” he said. “I was straight through the fairway. Hit a bit of a rough 7 iron, pulled it left again. And then hit a great gap wedge to about 5 or 6 feet and just saw the line, just made the putt.
Jacob Hillman and Kai Nafzinger led the Mounties with scores of 41 as Mount Greylock posted team wins of 171-208 against the Spartans and 171-217 against the Eagles. Monument Mountain and Mount Everett did not score against one another.
Like Svrluga, Hillman had his only problem hole early on, picking up a double bogey on the par-3 second hole.
Overall, though, he was consistent.
“I was hitting the ball really well,” Hillman said. “I hit every fairway. I hit seven greens. I was happy with that. I couldn’t really make a put. I had a lot of birdie putts in good spots, but just couldn’t make one.
“But it’s nice that I can play like this and still have a team around me that can end up winning some matches.”
Nafzinger birdied the par-4 10th hole to catch Hillman for a share of the medalist honors. Max Easton rounded out Mount Greylock’s scoring with a 46.
Last fall, Mount Greylock won enough matches to go to the Division 2 Western Massachusetts Championships, and the Mounties got off a strong start in their quest to return with a pair of wins on Monday.
Monument Mountain and Mount Everett are looking to make a run at the post-season in Divisions 2 and 3, respectively.
The Eagles do so with a young roster that features just one senior, Finn Vion, who led the way on Monday with a 48.
“And then I have junior, and then the rest of them are sophomores, freshmen and even seventh and eighth-graders,” Mount Everett coach Anthony Bleau said. “We have a lot of young kids.
“The big thing is just getting them out there in the summer, to play in the summer. … It’s tough to, in this area, especially where we are in southern Berkshire, with Egremont closed. [Wyantenuck] is a private club, and they give the kids a great deal, but not everybody can do it. And Wyantenuck is nice enough to let Monument and [Mount Everett] host matches here, but I understand that the membership doesn’t want us overtaking their course for practices.”
Bleau has taken his team to Connecticut’s Canaan Country Club in the past and is looking at getting some time on another course south of the state line this fall.
“The school is definitely accommodating with the transportation piece,” he said. “It’s just that I don’t know what times are available, what leagues are going on and, as you get later in the season, it gets darker earlier. It’s hard.”
Chasing Vion on Monday was teammate Gus Gleason, who birdied the par-3 seventh hole on his way to a 51.
Monument Mountain was led by Luke Naventi with a 48 on a day when the Spartans coach Edward Locke saw some things to like and some things to work on in the weeks ahead.
“It’s the first match of the year, and we haven’t had a lot of practice time in,” he said. “We hit a lot of balls on the range, which obviously doesn’t tell you anything about how they’re going to play. And we have a lot of new faces. … We have two seniors, two freshmen and seven sophomores.
“Some kids played more [in the summer] than others. But hitting golf balls or playing in summer scrambles and that kind of thing doesn’t prepare you very well for the actual course conditions you’re going to find. Overall, though, they can all hit the ball a mile. It’s getting it from the mile into the hole that becomes the issue.”
Mount Greylock sophomore Hillman put in a lot of miles this summer on the junior golf circuit. He won a Northeastern New York PGA Junior title in early June at the Mounties’ home course, Waubeeka Golf Links, and, more recently, went to Montgomery, N.Y., to card a two-round score of 7-over-par and win the Hurricane Junior Golf Tour’s New York Fall Junior Open by 12 strokes.
“I also have one big tournament coming up in the fall,” Hillman said. “I got invited to the Cape Cod National Golf Club High School Invitational, Sept. 21 at Cape Cod National. So that’s circled on the calendar.
“That’ll be fun to play against the best competition in the state. I think it’s the winners of the [three] state divisions, a couple of the bigger high schools that are solid and then 10 individuals.”
Mount Everett (217): Finn Vion 48; Gus Gleason 51; Mason Kemp 55; Johnny Ireland 63; Chet Schur 63; Mason Daley 71.
Mount Greylock (171): Jacob Hillman 41; Will Svrluga 43; Max Easton 46; Kai Nafzinger 41; Max Wied 47; Odin Wojtkowski 53.
Monument Mountain (208): Liam Smith 52; Kasen Raifstanger 59; Steve Woodard 64; Theo Curletti 50; Luke Naventi 48; Bodhi Cohen 58.