HOLLIDAYSBURG —
This year’s District 6 Class AA Boys Golf Championship ended much the same as last year’s event at Scotch Valley Country Club.
Central Cambria senior Max Kirsch repeated as individual District 6-AA champion.
The Red Devils repeated as team champions.
And, Richland senior Brady Moran finished as the individual runner-up to Kirsch for a second consecutive year.
“It’s a lot of fun playing against Brady,” Kirsch said. “We have fun with it because we know we go back and forth. We’re used to it.”
Kirsch trailed by a stroke entering Wednesday’s round and fell behind by three strokes with four holes to play, but the senior was resilient.
“Max had a stellar performance,” Central Cambria coach Tom Aurandt said. “Max has a way of willing himself to win. When Max is in position, he has the will, the desire and the ability to pull it off.”
Kirsch shot a second-round 75 on Wednesday to finish with a two-day total of 146, one stroke better than Moran.
“He was up three with four to play,” Kirsch said. “Anything can happen. I just had to keep playing.
“On 15 I made a 10-foot, downhill, left-to-right putt for par and he bogeyed. He was up one going into 18. I parred and he doubled.”
Moran had an opening-round 70 on Tuesday and held a one-shot advantage over Kirsch. Moran carded a 77 in the second round.
“I knew the back nine was going to be pretty much for all the marbles,” Moran said. “(Kirsch) played solid all day and kept the pressure on me all day. At one point I had a three-stroke lead, and then it was tied.”
The top six individuals qualified to play a regional at Tom’s Run Country Club in Blairsville on Monday.
“You’ve got to play well at districts because districts are the hardest thing to get through to go to states,” Moran said. “I had to play my game and get through it.”
Homer-Center’s Ian Illig finished third (79-74 153), followed by Claysburg’s Tyler Brown (79-77 156), Northern Cambria’s Tyler Tiesi (74-83 157) and Saint Joseph’s Garrett Bastardi (79-80 159).
As a team, Central Cambria shot 636 (319-317) to finish 24 strokes better than runner-up Richland. Homer-Center (706) and Penn Cambria (722) rounded out the top-4 teams.
District 6 champion Central Cambria will face District 5 champ Conemaugh Township in a PIAA Sub Regional match on Friday at Scotch Valley, beginning at 10 a.m. The winner will advance to the PIAA Championship Tournament at Heritage Country Club in York on Oct. 22-23.
“Everybody played well as a team,” Aurandt said. “We have two young players, Dom Stevens (84-79), a sophomore, and Jeremey Eckenrode
(84-80), a freshman, and both of those guys improved their play by two or three strokes. Sam Stevens (80-83) is a senior who keeps the guys loose. It was a total team effort. We won as a team.”
“It was pretty cool to win as a team again, definitely,” Kirsch said.
In Wednesday’s first round of the District 6-AA Girls Championship at Penn State White Course, Bishop McCort led with a 420.
Second-place Forest Hills had 480.
Penn Cambria’s Madison Krug is second in the 6-AA girls field with an 88, and Cambria Heights’ Morgan Spaid is third at 89. The final round will be held today.
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