Green Mountain junior Gabe Goodman cruised to the medalist title Monday at Bear Creek Golf Club with a 2-under-par, 70. (Dennis Pleuss/Jeffco Athletics)
LAKEWOOD — There was no place like home for Green Mountain junior Gabe Goodman on Monday.
On his home course — Bear Creek Golf Club — the junior easily grabbed the lowest round of the day at the Class 5A/4A Jeffco League match and invitational hosted by Green Mountain High School. Goodman shot a 2-under-par 70 to leap past Evergreen senior Lenny Urbas for the overall 4A Jeffco medalist lead at the midway point of the conference season.
“I just played really solid throughout. I made a couple of really good putts on the front-nine for birdies,” said Goodman, who fired a 33 on the front-nine. “This is my home course so I know it pretty well. I know were you can miss and today I put the ball where I needed to.”
It was the first individual medalist victory of the season for Goodman. Urban captured the opening two 4A Jeffco tournaments at Deer Creek and Foothills, but a 10 on a par-4 on the front-nine was a big reason why Urban failed to win his third straight league tournament.
Goodman holds a two-stroke lead over Urban with three league tournaments to play. Each individual is able to drop their worst round to have only five tournaments count in the final individual standings.
“The 10 was not good,” said Urbas, who finished with a respectable round of 78. “It’s definitely a good course to play. It’s an eye opening course. It really touches on the parts of your game that you can get better.”
Evergreen senior Lenny Urbas chips onto the 9th green Monday at Bear Creek Golf Club. (Dennis Pleuss/Jeffco Athletics)
Evergreen was able to expand its team lead over 4A defending state champion Valor Christian. The Cougars hold a 34-stroke lead at the midway point.
“It’s very important. I lot of things can happen in those last couple of (league) tournaments,” Urbas said of Evergreen’s lead in the team standings. “Having a little bit of a cushion is nice. Hopefully we can expand on that.”
On the 5A side, Lakewood continued its dominance winning its third 5A Jeffco tournament. The Tigers are closing in on a 100-stroke lead over second-place Ralston Valley.
Senior Griffin Barela shot a 4-over-par 76 to win the 5A Jeffco medalist title at Bear Creek. Lakewood junior Jack Castiglia (80) and senior Max Camp-Oberhauser (86) joined Barela in the top-10.
“These last two tournaments I haven’t played my best, but I think we are still in a good spot,” Barela said. “Going into these last three (league) tournaments, I really like all three courses so I should put some good rounds together to wrap up the individual title and team title.”
Lakewood junior Jack Castiglia eyes a chip Monday at Bear Creek Golf Club. (Dennis Pleuss/Jeffco Athletics)
The closest contender to Barela is Columbine senior Marcus Tait, who wasn’t happy with his round of 80 on Monday. Tait is six shots behind Barela in the overall 5A Jeffco medalist standings.
“I didn’t putt well and didn’t do well around the green. I hit the ball well. I just have to figure things out,” Tait said. “I want to play these last three league tournament even or under-par so I can wave this 80 away and finish the season well.”
The next 5A/4A Jeffco League tournament is scheduled for Friday, Sept. 2, at Indian Tree Golf Course in Arvada. Urbas had a little tongue-in-cheek comment heading into the next league meet.
“I’m going to kick everyone’s butt at Indian Tree later this week,” Urbas said with a smile.
Bear Creek Golf Club
Class 5A Jeffco
Team results
Lakewood 330, Ralston Valley 361, Columbine 373, Dakota Ridge 373, Chatfield 375, Bear Creek 377, Pomona 398, Arvada West 400
Individual results (top-10)
Griffin Barela, Lakewood, 76
Riese Delarber, Bear Creek, 78
Landon Thunell, Ralston Valley, 79
Marcus Tait, Columbine, 80
Jack Castiglia, Lakewood, 80
Nick DiNapoli, Chatfield, 82
Jax Jones, Ralston Valley, 85
Max Camp-Oberhauser, Lakewood 86
Bryce Sutton, Pomona, 86
Max Mowry, Dakota Ridge, 87
Class 4A Jeffco
Team results
Evergreen 326, Green Mountain 335, Valor 336, Golden 336, D’Evelyn 360, Littleton 407, Wheat Ridge 412, Standley Lake 416, Conifer 450, Arvada 502
Individual results (top-10)
Gabe Goodman, Green Mountain, 70
Lenny Urbas, Evergreen, 78,
Bridger Tenney, Evergreen, 78
Willy O’Brien, Golden, 78
Jake Welch, Valor, 79
Nolan Miller, Evergreen, 81
Jack Schoenborn, Valor, 82
Chance Suadurapa, Golden, 85
Parker Skiles, Golden, 86
Zach Zurcher, Valor, 86
Columbine senior Marcus Tait still has a shot to win the 5A Jeffco medalist title with three league tournaments to go. (Dennis Pleuss/Jeffco Athletics)