The Gunnison High School golf team took home first place as a team at the Butch Braswell Memorial tournament in Salida on Tuesday, Sept. 15.
The Cowboys traveled east to Salida for a chance to play Salida Golf Club and left with a first-place trophy after shooting a 238 as a team.
“It was just a perfect day in Salida,” head coach Kevin Mickelson said. “It was beautiful. And I don't know, the kids just got confidence and did really well.”
The Cowboys were led by junior Kaiden Bartelli, who shot a 74 and was the individual champion. Despite double-bogeying the first hole, Bartelli still completed his best finish of the season.
He wasn’t the only Cowboy to finish in the top five either; sophomore John Dempsey shot a 79 at the tournament and placed fourth.
Sophomore Jack Solomon shot an 85 and placed ninth, and sophomore Kade Torres shot a 95 and placed 21st to round out the scores for the Cowboys.
Mickelson emphasized that in Salida, if you don’t keep it in the fairways you’re in trouble, but the four Cowboys drove the ball well all day and put the pieces together.
“I think it's just a matter of getting confidence in their own games, individual games,” Mickelson said when talking about the lower scores. “And they're starting to do that, which is always a great sign that they're staying the course.”
Heading into Monday’s tournament at Bridges Golf & Country Club in Montrose, Mickelson was hopeful that the Cowboys’ finish in Salida would unlock some lower scores in the last couple of tournaments of the year.
Unfortunately, due to weather conditions and long delays, the boys were not able to sustain the momentum they created in Salida while playing in Montrose.
“It was a terrible day,” Mickelson said. “It ended up being a nine-hour tournament with lightning and rain delays. And we did not shoot well. We underperformed and just didn't play well.”
Dempsey led the Cowboys with an 89 and a 28th-place finish, Bartelli and Wyatt Bielak each shot a 92 and tied for 37th, Spencer Reynolds shot a 100 and placed 48th, and Jude Matzinger shot a 103 and placed 51st.
The scores were down across the board, Mickelson noted. Not a single player finished the tournament under par.
“Well, just like what we said, just like water off a duck's butt, that's golf,” Mickelson said when talking about how to put this tournament behind them. “You just got to have a short-term memory and keep doing what we're doing and try and finish strong with these last couple of varsity tournaments we have.”
The varsity boys will take a week off and then return to play in Gypsum on Monday, Sept. 21, at Gypsum Creek Golf Course. Depending on the scores, the boys might play the following day at Tiara Rado Golf Course in Grand Junction.
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