NHS golf team on solid footing

After one day of the 2023 4A Boys State Golf Tournament, Niwot's Emmett Shell was flying high on the leaderboard. The senior overcame some challenging weather and the difficulty of The Bridges Golf & Country Club in Montrose to notch a 1-over par 72, just two shots off the lead.

If not for a missed, three-foot par putt on his 13th hole of the day and an out of bounds drive on his closing hole, Shell may have found himself in truly rarified air.

"Emmett may have had the best day of his high school career from my perspective," Niwot Coach Ed Weaver reflected. "Mentally, more than anything, he was playing really well. You could make the case that if he makes that short putt and he doesn't go out of bounds on the last, you'd be talking the lead."

Instead, Shell found himself starting Day 2 of the state tournament in fifth place, but still well within striking distance.

Even after a pair of back-to-back bogeys on holes 3 and 4, Shell was on pace for a Top 10 finish when he closed out the front nine with an eagle 3 on the par 5 ninth hole, and was still just three over par for the event.

But those hopes were dashed when trouble struck on the final nine. Two double bogeys and three bogeys closed out his round, leaving him with a two-day total of 151 and tied for 16th place with Longs Peak rivals Bradley Weinmaster, last year's state champion, and Aiden Sweeney, both from Riverdale Ridge High School.

The Ravens from Riverdale finished the tournament in third place, seven shots behind the tournament winner Evergreen High School. The individual gold medal was captured by Montrose High School senior Noah Richmond, who charged up the leaderboard all the way from 10th place after Day 1 with a blistering round of 65 to finish two shots ahead of Evergreen teammates Liam Houlihan and Tyler Long. The juniors sat one and two atop the leaderboard after the first round only to see Richmond charge past with a round that included a seven-under par 28 on his first nine holes on Day 2.

For Niwot's Drew Stapp, his first trip to the state tournament was a challenge from the outset. The junior struggled through the difficult conditions with five bogeys and two double bogeys over his first nine holes. Stapp was never able to get back on track through the remaining 27 holes finishing with a two-day total of 172.

Despite Stapp's struggles, his coach hopes he learned some things from the experience that will benefit his player next year in his senior season.

"I hope he learns how to have some composure from this," Weaver explained. "It's about being able to remain composed from the standpoint of when it's not going the way you want it to go, you have to do something different. When Drew struggles, he tends to try and speed everything up. It's just the opposite of what needs to happen. Take a deep breath and calm yourself down. When he keeps his tempo right with his swing, it's beautiful. But if he speeds it up, just a little bit, it can get ugly quickly. It's all about speed and tempo."

And Weaver is expecting big things from Stapp in 2024.

"He's a leader and I've told him I'm going to be looking for him to take a leadership role. I look around at next year's team and we have some really good, but young, players coming back, so I ask myself, who's going to be the leaders. I know Drew can be that guy."

From a season that began with the bitter taste of the previous year's trainwreck at the regional tournament, this year's Cougar team, which featured just two seniors, Shell and Brighton Langenegger, put the program back on a solid footing, sending two players to the state tournament and just missing out on qualifying their team for the 4A state event.

It was the experience that this year's young team was able to gain during the season that has Weaver gushing with optimism for next season.

"We were able to give every kid on the team a chance to play in at least one competitive event. That was awesome because there've been years where that hasn't happened because kids weren't ready, or the kid didn't want to because he didn't think he was ready. But every kid on this team had the ability to play in an event and they did.

"I don't remember what the exact number was, but of the 18 players on the team, at least eight or nine of them had personal bests this year. That might be their best nine-hole round or best 18-hole round or best finish in a tournament standing. That's pretty exciting," Weaver said.

"I told them at our (end of season) banquet that the 2024 season starts right now, and you know I've already seen them out on the course since then. I've seen Jackson (Sessa), and Sawyer (Bennett), and Bast (Sebastian Bennett), and Devin (Farahani), and Will (Jones). I've seen all of them out there and that's what it's going to take. Yeah, I'm very high on our boys' program."