By Dominic Scianna

Whitney Young edged Lane Tech by two strokes to win a closely contested nine-hole Chicago Public League (CPL) Girls Golf City Championship final on September 21 at Indian Boundary Golf Course in Chicago. The win marked the Dolphins’ third consecutive city title. 

Lane had won the previous three regular-season head-to-head battles with Young this season, but in the city championship, the Dolphins gained the upper hand led by the duo of Mackenzie Trovero (carding a 43 for second place), and Isabella Rozwat (who posted a score of 44 for third place).

“In professional golf, team championships use a cumulative total over a series of days, but with the CPL their format is a one-day competition. I’m very grateful and we were a bit lucky to win, but we have a good team that performed and finished strong with some of their best scores this season,” said Deborah Johnson, Whitney Young’s head coach.

For the Dolphins, the fourth time was the charm in besting Lane but it took a team effort to secure the two-stroke victory by the four-player cumulative team score of 184 to Lane’s 186.

“We’ve been neck and neck with Lane most of the time this year. I’m very proud of my team because we have great morale and we were able to play our best today to win (the championship),” Trovero said. 

Whitney Young was able to put the past results versus Lane aside and concentrate on the task at hand in the city finals.

“It was unexpected since we played Lane the previous three times and had lost, but we pulled it together and won today when it mattered,” added Rozwat. 

Lily Cohen and Grace Gotelaere were co-individual champions for Lane, finishing with scores of 42 each. 

Both Cohen and Gotelaere took their tough team loss in stride and are turning their focus to the postseason and the IHSA playoff competition that begins this week.

“It means everything to share this (the individual CPL city championship) with Grace,” said Cohen.

“It was an amazing experience,” said Gotelaere. “We had a great day today (but just fell short). We need to putt better and we’ll use this experience to improve (for the state tournament).”

Final results also saw Jones College Prep finish third in the team competition with a score of 207, followed by Taft at 219 placing fourth. 

Individual fourth-place scoring honors went to Whitney Young’s Ariya Chang, who shot a 46. Chloe Guzik (Payton) and Araceli Condie-Espinosa (Amundsen) shot final-round scores of 47 to tie for fifth place.

Photos by Margo Grogan/OSA