Coast regroups, wins OEC matchup by 14 shots
COSTA MESA -- Following a rough OEC outing last week, the Orange Coast College men's golf team got the message and stepped things up in a BIG way on Wednesday at Santa Ana Country Club.
Playing on their home course, the Pirates shot an impressive even-par 360 as a team to cruise to a 14-shot victory over the rest of the Orange Empire Conference competition, a far cry from last week's sixth-place score of 389 at Sycuan Golf Resort.
"I told these guys after last week that they just can't simply show up and they'll just hand over the team trophy," OCC head coach Sean Collins said. "They are a very talented group but they still need to put in the work in order to be successful. Looks like they got the message."
A pair of Pirates earned medalist honors for the day as Marcus Mercado-Kiel and Kyle Pollema each shot a 2-under-par 70. Kyle Melchiorre and Michael Chen each carded a 1-over, 73 and teammate Riley Murphy was close behind with a 2-over, 74.
Here was how impressive the Pirates were on Wednesday ... David Pelekoudas, whose solid 3-over, 75 was not counted in the OCC scoring (only the top-five scores are counted), would have been the top scorer on two of the other teams in the field and a top-three scorer on six of the other teams.
Santiago Canyon, led by Austin Amaya's even-par 72, finished a distant second with a team score of 374. Cuyamaca was third at 378, while Cypress (381), Riverside (385), Palomar (387), Irvine Valley (389) and Saddleback (391) round out the scoring.
By picking up all seven wins, Coast improves to 16-5 in the OEC and will take on the same competition again on Monday at 11 a.m. down at Twin Oaks, home course for Palomar College.
