Shida, Young lead Golf to second place in Pensacola

The No. 9 Georgia College golf team traveled to Florida on Feb. 29 through March 1 to compete in their second match of the Spring season, taking second place in the Argonaut Invitational hosted by the University of West Florida. The Bobcats finished just three strokes behind the tournament champion, the host No. 5 University of West Florida.

“You want to win, but second’s better than third. We’ve made improvements each week the last two tournaments,” Head Coach Jimmy Wilson said. “If we can learn from it and continue to improve and get better every time we go out there we going to be fine by the end of the year.”

 

The Bobcats finished the first round of the invitational with an overall score of 298. On Monday’s second round, the Bobcats finished with a combined score of 287, which was 11 strokes lower than West Florida, who finished Monday’s second round with a score of 298. For Tuesday’s round, Georgia College shot 292, which was just two strokes behind West Florida, who finished at 290.

“Like most of our events, we played 36 holes in one day. Kids don’t physically tired but they’ll get mental fatigue. It happens to everybody out there and it’s the kids can finished the second round, which we did. We had the low round of the tournament in the second round. That’s probably the hardest thing to do,” Wilson said. “It’s something we’re going to work on throughout the spring to try to become even more mentally tough.”

Finishing first for the Bobcats was senior Billy Shida, who shot a 75 in the opening round and a 74 in Monday’s second round. Shida finished out the tournament strong on Tuesday when he shot a 66, which jumped him from 23rd place to third place overall. Finishing second for Georgia College and sixth in the overall tournament was senior Joe Young. Young finished Monday’s first round with a 73 and shot a 70 for the second round. On Tuesday he shot a 74, which gave him a total score of 217, finishing just two strokes behind his fellow Bobcat Shida and placing him at sixth in the Argonaut Invitational.

Completing the tournament in third for Georgia College and inside the top-20 for the tournament was senior Matthew Yonz. Following Yonz for the Bobcats was sophomore Patrick Garrett, who finished 25th place in the overall tournament. Bringing up the rear and playing the first tournament of his college career was junior Bayley Craig, who finished 53rd. The Bobcats are next heading to Valdosta State University on March 4 to compete in the First Federal Southeastern Collegiate.

“Coaching golf is different than coaching other sports. It’s more of an individual thing so you’ll work with each kid individually and share my thoughts on how they can get better,” Wilson said.