Boys golf: Sylvester, Wilhelm lead catfight for NCS D2 title between Marin Catholic, Marin Academy

Charlie Wilhelm fought back the bad memories of last year’s North Coast Section golf tournament as he stepped up to the first tee at Peacock Gap Golf Club on Monday morning.

“I had a bad back last year,” the Marin Academy golfer said, recalling last season’s NCS Division II tournament at Petaluma’s Rooster Run Golf Club “I had a flashback to last year when I just fell to my knees on the first tee because it hurt after I took my first shot.”

Wilhelm has since recovered and had one of his best outings Monday with a 2-under par 69 to finish sixth in a three-way tiebreaker and qualify for next week’s NCS D-I tournament at Tilden Park Golf Course in Berkeley.

“This was like a practice round. It felt really good,” said Wilhelm, who was playing on his team’s home course. “I wasn’t putting great. Some of my putts didn’t fall, so I felt like I left some strokes out there, but it’s OK.”

Matching Wilhelm’s 69 score were El Cerrito’s David Navarro, who placed fifth, and Marin Catholic’s Mason Sylvester, who placed seventh in the tiebreaker to also qualify for next week’s tournament.

“I just tried to take it one hole at a time and not get ahead of myself,” Sylvester said. “It was a good day early on, then the wind picked up later.

Among those who punched their tickets Monday at Peacock Gap are Marin Catholic’s Theo Anderson (71) in eighth place and Marin Academy’s Charlie Hansen (72) in 11th place. Anderson matched his score from last season’s tournament, when he placed third.

“We had our best team score of the season at this course against Branson, so that gave us some confidence for today,” Anderson said. “We knew we could play well here.”

The comfortable and familiar setup at Peacock Gap served the local golfers well, as Marin Catholic and Marin Academy finished in a tie for the top team score at 301. Marin Catholic edged its Wildcat counterpart for the NCS D2 team championship in a tiebreaker, decided by the highest individual scores for each five-player lineup.

Also scoring for Marin Catholic were Kyle Forrest (77), Kadeth Halboth (84) and Luca DeNunzio (87). Rounding out Marin Academy’s scorecards were Dylan Siegel (79), Drayson Jaffee (81) and Quin McInerney (94).

Miramonte (305) finished third, followed by Cardinal Newman (307), Athenian (311), the Branson School (313), Justin-Siena (315), Berean Christian (317), Head Royce (324), Arcata (338), Middleton (347) and Willits (425)

The top 18 individual golfers advance to next week’s tournament. Three MCAL teams already qualified for the NCS D-I tournament at the league championships on April 29 at Novato’s Stone Tree Golf Club. MCAL champion Tam, Redwood and Terra Linda will all be sending six players to Berkeley.

The qualifying cutoff score came in at 74 on a day when the record books came under fire and five players finished in the red. College Prep’s Will Chang turned in the low score of the day at 5-under 66, six strokes off the course record.

Branson sophomore Barry Liu narrowly missed the cut with a 75, leading teammates Jack Hillboe (78), Aria Saluja (80), Carl Smith (80) and Jay Nagpal (96). San Marin’s Noah Duncan (80), San Rafael’s Kai Payne (85) and Novato’s Sam Ojeda (95) also competed in Monday’s tournament.

“The greens were decent and the weather was pretty much ideal,” Liu said.

Saluja is heading to the University of Chicago after graduation, but has confidence in his returning teammates.

“I hope the team improves,” Saluja said while patting Liu on the shoulder. “I know these guys are really good and can do even better.”