With more numbers than ever, Pelham’s boys’ golf team is excited for the spring season.

Pelham boys’ golf is loaded with new players and expecting to make cuts for the first time in years, according to coach Tom Roksvold. Now the team hopes to send players to sectionals and build off of last season.

After graduating impact players last year like captain Jack Howard, who now plays at Bates College, Coach Roksvold is hoping some returning players and newcomers can take on bigger roles in order to make up for the loss. “I’m expecting Aidan Bennett, Eric Soderberg to step up along with Jack Morrell and Luke Tarazi,” said Roksvold “They will join Kieran Gilchrist, who is our top ranked player returning.” 

Gilchrist, a senior captain who will continue his golfing career next year at Gettysburg College, is aiming for the sectional tournament after reaching the competition in 2018 along with Howard. “Sectionals will be a goal,” he said. The top 60 players in Section One will move onto the sectional tournament, an individual competition. The best nine players in that tournament then go to states, which Gilchrist defined as a future goal.

Next year, Gilchrist will continue his golfing career at Gettysburg College. With him and Howard both playing DIII golf next year, he’s looking forward to a reunion. “Hopefully we’ll meet each other in the near future at the collegiate level,” Gilchrist said.

Some of the biggest regular season matches this year are the Rye games on April 25th and May 8th. These are important to winning the league, which Coach Roksvold says is “always one of the toughest to win.” The regular season for golf is structured in 6-player team vs. team match-ups in which the 5 lowest scores are totaled; the lowest score wins. Pelham beat Rye twice last year for the first time since 1991, according to Roksvold. Gilchrist says that the two victories last year make this year’s far more competitive. “Rye has become a rivalry,” he said.

The golf team kicks off their season on April 8th with three-team-match against New Rochelle and Mamaroneck at Bonnie Briar Country Club.