The Bishop Fenwick golf team had the honor of opening up the North Shore fall sports season on Saturday with a home match against Archbishop Williams, and the Crusaders didn’t disappoint. Behind strong performances from its three team captains, Fenwick notched a 185-169 win over its Catholic Central League foe at The Meadow at Peabody Golf Course.
“It was great to get out there and compete again,” said Fenwick coach Jim McHugh. “I was really happy with the way we played overall in our first match. I thought we were really in control and we got good showings from everyone who went out there.”
Fenwick co-captain Cade Buckley led the way for the Crusaders with 34 points, while co-captain Gavin Belt notched 32 points and co-captain John Bennett contributed 27 points. Senior Brandon Bloom (25 points) also played well in the victory.
“It’s always great when your top guys come through and make such a big contribution,” said McHugh. “All the guys went out there and looked good and didn’t show any nerves, so it was a solid showing all around.”
The Crusaders were able to use their home-course advantage in this one, knocking their way around the treacherous, hazard-lined fairways of The Meadow at Peabody.
“We’re a tough team to beat at home,” said McHugh. “Obviously we play at a tough course where you really have to know where to hit the ball and where to leave it, so when we get teams that come through who aren’t as familiar with the course we have a solid advantage.”
Aside from the strong performances at the top of the rotation, Fenwick got some key contributions from a few newcomers to the team this season. After coming over from other sports, Alex Gonzalez (24 points), Jason Romans (23 points) and Steven Woods (20 points) helped turn the tide in Fenwick’s favor against Williams.
“I can already tell that those guys are going to be a big part of our team this year, they’re all great athletes and they really add to our depth,” McHugh said of Wood, Romans and Gonzalez. “To have guys like that in the middle of our lineup is huge because there aren’t many teams that go four, five or six players deep. I think without those guys out there, we would’ve had a tough time winning the match.”
While McHugh acknowledges there are certainly still improvements to be made at this early point in the season, he thinks that this boost of confidence from the season-opening win will help carry the team into its next match.
“We still have plenty to work on in a lot of areas, particularly putting and reading putts, which I don’t think we spend enough time on,” said McHugh. “But the guys are hitting it well and working well together, so things have gotten off to a solid start. I think we’ll really be able to take a lot of confidence from our performance this weekend and hopefully we’ll be able to keep it going into this coming week.
“We’ve got matches on Monday, Thursday and Saturday this week, so I think if we can come out of this week with a 3-1 record we’ll be in great shape,” McHugh added. “I said that to the guys and they all said they wanted to be 4-0 at the end of the week, so it looks like everyone is in the right frame of mind.”
Fenwick will go up against CCL newcomer Bishop Feehan Monday afternoon (3) at Heather Hill Country Club in Plainville.
