In a back-and-forth state championship meet on Monday and Tuesday, the Corinth girls golf team steadied the ship just enough to make history.
Corinth erased an early deficit to leapfrog East Central and win the MHSAA Class 5A title at Whispering Pines Golf Course in Hurley. It’s the school’s first-ever state girls golf championship.
“Our girls were really locked in (Tuesday) and focused and not paying attention to a lot of stuff going on,” Corinth coach Rob Scarbrough said. “It showed at the end of the day, when the last putt fell, that you could tell that we had a little bit more focus than everybody else did.”
The Warriors trailed East Central, the defending 5A champion, by 10 shots after the first nine holes on Day 1. However, Corinth cut the deficit to two strokes heading into Day 2.
On that second day, Corinth fell behind by as many as seven strokes but came back to win the championship by three. The Warriors had a score of 321 to East Central’s 324.
“It was just a battle all day, really,” Scarbrough said. “They go ahead, we went ahead a time or two, and then they jump back ahead. It was just back and forth.”
Camden Lewis led the Warriors and was second among individuals with a score of 154. Ella Davis was fifth with a 167. Scarbrough felt that the two were instrumental to the title.
“They really felt confident on the back nine,” he said. “And that’s when we closed the gap on day one, and that’s when we won.”
Zela Dalton finished 12th (192) and Madeline Brooks placed 23rd (225).
Lafayette finished not far behind in third place with a team score of 369. Pontotoc placed seventh with a 394.
Other area results
Booneville came close to winning Class I, but ultimately finished second behind Our Lady Academy by two strokes. The Blue Devils did have the top individual finisher, Andie Ramey, whose two-day score of 137 was good for three strokes under par.
Saltillo finished second in 6A behind Hancock with a 352. The Tigers were led by Indiana Sistrunk, whose 165 was good for fourth place.
Sasha Challagolla, an eighth grader from Starkville, finished two strokes out of first place with a 148 in Class 7A. Oxford finished in sixth place, Tupelo in 11th and Starkville in 13th. Josephine Frazier led the Golden Wave with a 180, good for 20th place.
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