On Sept. 18 at the Bonita Golf Course, the Bonita Vista High (BVH) varsity girls’ golf team lost to Mater Dei High (MDH) by a margin of 30 strokes. Despite their loss, the Lady Barons were anything but mad about the outcome, because they set a new season low score for themselves and narrowed the gap between themselves and MDH. Their lack of hard feelings was somewhat caused by the sportsmanlike nature of golf in general.
“Golf is like no other sport in that players will cheer for their opponents when they make a great shot,” said Head girls’ golf coach Tony Valdez.
In golf, teams of six aim to play the holes of a course in as little strokes as they can. Every stroke is a point, so after a match the total points of all six players are added—and whichever team has the least amount of points wins the match. BVH ended their match against MDH with a score of 231, while MDH scored 201. Although the loss may seem dramatic, Valdez explained how their score against a California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) powerhouse like MDH showed the ways in which BVH has actually improved over the years.
“MDH is a Division II power that won CIF State Girls Golf Championships three times in a row. Their last player on their top six is probably better than my best player. We play them every year, but this year in particular was our closest score to them so it really shows our improvement as a team and our competitiveness with one of the best teams in San Diego county,” Valdez said.
Valdez has been coaching BVH girls’ golf for four years, and he has only had one player play with him from her freshman to senior year, that being captain and senior Alexis Acosta. Along with Valdez, Acosta has also had the opportunity to view the team’s improvement from year to year.
“There’s been a lot of change as I’ve grown with the team over my four years. Overtime I’ve seen people who came into the game with little experience developing a real love and care for it,” Acosta said.
Two such players that have developed a newfound care for the sport are sophomore Andrea Roman and junior Abigail Pilar. Roman played well last season, but after working tirelessly throughout the offseason to improve her gameplay, she came back as a new and improved golfer. Pilar on the other hand, is not a consistent member of the team’s top six players for matches, but when one of the original top six couldn’t make it to their match against MDH, Pilar got the opportunity to step up and play her best.
“Pilar had to step up in a last minute difficult situation. I called her when she was in class and she made it [to the course] right before she was supposed to play, meaning that she didn’t have the time to warm up or know who or where she was going to play that day. Despite her challenges, she teed off on time and helped our team to our lowest score of the year,” Valdez said.
Of the girls on BVH’s roster, junior and captain Victoria Takaki scored a 43 against MDH, the lowest number of points for the team that day. Most girls that play golf for BVH start the sport with little experience in it, but Takaki started playing the sport from a young age. This has resulted in her being a consistent top two player on BVH’s roster since her freshman year. Takaki is also a dancer for BVH’s dance team Get to the Pointe!, where her training in dance helped her quality of performance in golf.
“Dance has helped me with golf because of the lessons that it has taught me about self discipline, my body mechanics, and the ways in which it has passively trained me for golf,” Takaki said.
Contrasting her co-captain’s near lifetime experience with competitive golf, Acosta is one of the girls on the team that had to climb her way to a starting position. Growing up, golf was a recreational activity that she would do with her father as a pastime and was a change of pace from softball, which she considers to be her main sport. According to Acosta, the relationship between softball and golf are interconnected so competing in both sports is beneficial to her goals.
“Golf helps my softball swing and softball hurts my golf swing,” Acosta said. “[Golf and softball] require different motions and hand placements, but golf really helps with my hip rotation and getting my hands around.”
When Acosta started playing golf for BVH in her freshman year, Valdez noticed and appreciated her previous experience with softball because it made coaching her easier. Valdez went on to state his pride in Acosta’s growth from then to now.
“Acosta was the only freshman [on this team] to start golfing during the COVID-19 pandemic. Not many people were doing much, but [Acosta’s] experience as a softball player and as an athlete gave her the ability to persevere. She didn’t play much as a freshman, and now she starts for us and has been a great leader and captain for two years,” Valdez said.
The team’s success over the past season is not only a result of the hard work and commitment that the players have dedicated to the sport, but also a result of the positive attitude that Valdez pushes to his players. Takaki mentions how it is important to foster a good attitude in golf, because the individuality of the sport makes it so that on the field aggression is aimed internally rather than externally.
“[Golf] is different from other sports because with this sport, players don’t get mad at other teams but instead they get mad at themselves,” Takaki said. “Valdez is very positive and he makes sure that I’m never getting on myself for taking a bad shot which is important because I tend to be pretty negative about that.”
Valdez’s positive coaching style has especially shown its effectiveness this year. Not only did the girls recently get their lowest team score of the season, but a handful of them have also achieved personal records for low points this year. As a collective and as individuals, this team is only rising through the ranks because of the players’ determination and Valdez’s dedication.
“I’m really proud of these girls because in terms of team wins and low scores, this team is the most successful that I’ve seen. This year and these players are special, I’m sure of it,” Valdez said.
