Both the women’s and men’s teams battled through their weekend tournaments to bittersweet endings. On the women’s side, a day of rain meant a shortened tournament at Wellesley College; for the men, a much lower second-round score wasn’t enough to qualify them for the NESCAC Championship.
Women
The women’s team only played one day of golf at this weekend’s Wellesley Ann S. Batchelder Invitational, but they managed to squeeze some success into it. After Saturday’s round was rained out, the seven attending teams played a single round on Sunday. With a team score of 340, Amherst placed second—five strokes behind Middlebury College and eight ahead of Williams College.
After last weekend’s victory at Mt. Holyoke College, the team had high expectations for itself. “Although we didn’t score as well as hoped, nobody let the conditions totally get to them,” said captain Kinne Schwartz ’10, who finished first on the team. “Playing in inclement weather always puts extra strain on a player with the slower play and things of that nature, so maintaining our patience is something we can be proud of.”
The team’s five lowest scores belonged to the same golfers as in the first two tournaments—Schwartz, Elaine Lin ’12, Laura Monty ’12, Nina Yoo ’12 and Hayley Milbourn ’11. The order, however, was different, with Milbourn, who usually leads the Jeffs, slipping to fifth on the team. The Jeffs posted competitive individual scores, and all five placed within the top 20 of 41 golfers. Amherst’s depth was once again its best asset, as the Jeffs’ fifth-place golfer placed ahead of every other team’s fourth-place golfer.
Though they did well, the Jeffs look forward to an even better showing at next weekend’s Middlebury Invitational. “I thought the team did a good job of sticking it through the rough weather,” said Lin, “But I think we’re also eager to play in normal conditions and post solid scores to give us a chance to win the Middlebury Invitational next weekend.”
Schwartz is similarly excited to play at Middlebury. “Next weekend will definitely be a challenge. Middlebury has a strong team and we’ll be playing at their home course. I think our team has enough depth and talent to take the tournament though.”
Men
The men’s team entered this weekend’s NESCAC qualifier with its sights set on qualifying for the spring championship. But with the top four of 10 teams (Middlebury, Trinity, Hamilton, and Williams) making the cut, the Jeffs’ sixth-place finish put them out of championship contention.
After posting a first-round team score of 318, the Jeffs returned on Sunday to drop 13 strokes and tally 305. All five of Amherst’s golfers—Adam Shiderman ’10, Trip Wray ’11, Nate Belkin ’12, and tri-captains Chris Valentine ’09 and Glenn Wong ’09— scored lower in the second round.
Shniderman, playing in his first tournament following a knee injury, praised the team’s 24-hour turnaround as instrumental in the final standings. “We got off to a rough start the first day, but had a much better day [Sunday] ... Overall we played pretty well as a team with [Sunday] being our best round as far back as I can remember.”
Still, the Jeffs struggled on their short game. According to Shniderman, who earned Second Team All-NESCAC honors, this was due to the course’s difficulty. “The greens at Middlebury are pretty tough, as were the pin placements this weekend. Most of us struggled to really make putts, even those of us that didn’t putt poorly, struggled to really get any streaks going.” He put the weekend into perspective, claiming that the team “really did pretty well … and while we could’ve improved the first day, we’re very pleased with the performance today and overall.”
Though the Jeffs won’t be playing in the April NESCAC Championship, they have another tournament this fall and several next spring. According to Valentine, the team has “had dramatic improvement from last season and can only get better for next spring.”