Blacksburg High School’s golf team won the Metro Golf Tournament this past week. Team members pictured: (from left) David Zhang, Paul Duncan Sean Ruan, Melissa Meng and Miles Loeshen.
Members of two area junior golf tours got together on August 10 at the Clear Creek Golf Club in Bristol to take part in a match play event called the “2 Tour Challenge.”
Clear Creek served as a gracious host for the event and posed an excellent challenge for the young players.
Six players from the Tri-Cities section of the Sneds Tour competed against six all-stars from the Blue Ridge Junior Golf Tour.
On the opening nine, players formed teams of two and competed in a “better ball” format. On the inward nine holes, a player from each team competed against one from the other team in a singles format.
In the end, it was the Sneds Tour who was victorious by a score of 7-2.
In the “better ball” matches, the Blue Ridge Tour got a point on the board first as Jason Hall of Dublin paired with Jake Albert of Riner to defeat Zac Fletcher of Kingsport, TN and Dougie Fezell of Greeneville, Tennessee, 2 and 1.
The turning point of the tightly contested match came on the par 3 sixth hole when Hall made a long birdie putt from 30 feet. However, the Sneds Tour bounced back with wins in the other two matches of the beginning nine holes.
Seth Robinette of Blountsville, TN and Caleb Brumett of Abingdon kept the ball in play on the beginning holes to gain an early lead and defeat Trey Sparks of Tazewell and Graham Minarik of Radford, 3 and 2. Then John Cheek of Johnson City, TN worked with Lucas Lowe also of Johnson City, TN to break through in a match that was all square through five holes and defeat Bryce Sparks of Tazewell and Jack Davis of Radford, 3 and 2.
As play moved to the second nine holes, the Sneds Tour pulled away.
Zac Fletcher played solid by pelting long accurate drives off the tee and defeated Jason Hall 2 and 1.
In the second singles match, Seth Robinette overcame a two-down deficit by making clutch shots down the stretch en route to a 1 up victory over Jake Albert. Dougie Fezell kept the momentum going defeating Trey Sparks 4 to 2.
Next was Caleb Brummett who held on to win 1 up over Bryce Sparks.
The Blue Ridge Tour got their lone point on the second nine as Jack Davis defeated John Cheek 2 up. Lucas Lowe recorded the final point for the Sneds Tour as he defeated Graham Minarik 1 up.
For the win each member of the Sneds Team received a medallion. The team includes Cody Weems who served as coach for the day and also enjoys the role of tournament coordinator for the Sneds Tour in the tri-cities area.
This was the second year of the unique “2 Tour Challenge.” The Tours hope to continue the competition next summer.
Blacksburg picked up their second team win this past week when the Bruins claimed the 2019 Metro Golf Tournament in Roanoke by seven shots over Lord Botetourt. The team were within one stroke of each other after Day 1 before Blacksburg pulled away.
Melissa Meng shot a 72 on the second day to lead the BHS contingent. David Zhang was second with a 74.
–Staff reports
