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Ashland pulls away from pack for state berth Mail Tribune photos / Roy Musitelli Ashland freshman Stephanie Johns tees off at the Southern Oregon Conference girls district golf championship on Friday. Johns finished second behind Roseburg's Jennifer Gaston with a 178. Led by freshman Stephanie Johns, Grizzlies place second to powerful Roseburg squad By TIM TROWER Roseburg wins the Southern Oregon Conference girls golf championship with one arm tied behind its back. Second place is decided only after a scramble of such magnitude it belongs on a breakfast menu. So it went on the outside course at Rogue Valley Country Club Friday as Roseburg triumphed by nearly 100 strokes over runner-up Ashland, which in turn appeared to lose its grip on the No. 2 berth to state midway through the second day of play, only to pull comfortably clear of its pursuers. Two teams and the top five individuals qualified for the Class 4A state tournament May 13-14 at Trysting Golf Course in Corvallis. Roseburg played its second worst round of the year and still came in with a two-day total of 758. Ashland shot 851, and Grants Pass climbed from fourth the first day to third the second day, finishing at 884, eight strokes better than North Medford. South Medford played the first day but withdrew Friday to avoid conflict with its prom. Roseburg's Jennifer Gaston took individual honors with a 172 total following an 88 Friday. Freshman Stephanie Johns of Ashland was second at 178, followed by Melissa Carl of Roseburg with a 186, Ashland's Bianca Montagnino at 189 and North Medford's Kacie Kinney, also a freshman, at 192. Ashland coach Stephanie Santos expected to finish second, but she thought the trip there would be more comfortable. After the first couple of nine-hole scores were posted, the Grizzlies were creeping back to the pack. "Grants Pass was really on our butts," said Santos. "I thought our scoring would be a little better, but we did the best we could, and that's all you can ask for." Johns, who has made a name for herself with success in junior golf, couldn't get anything special going but kept plugging along to a 90. Montagnino, a senior who is a veteran of state bowling competition, gave the Grizzlies a shot in the arm with a front-side 44 and came in at 92, five strokes better than her first-day score. "Bianca knows what it takes to compete and to succeed," said Santos. "She really stepped it up. As a senior, she proved her leadership." The jumbled and ever-changing race for second place provided most of the excitement. None of the top players - Gaston, Johns and Kinney played in the final threesome - turned in their best performances. Gaston "didn't have a good day, but she kept her composure," nodded Indians coach Nora Eaton, whose team bettered by one stroke its highest one-day total, also at Rogue Valley. "When she had a bad hole, she didn't express it, she just went to the next hole." Johns said her round was the first she's had in the 90s in two years, but she didn't put anything worse than a 6 on her scorecard. "I didn't feel too great," she said. "Nothing good was happening. I never had any great shots like, 'Hey, that's good!' ... something that could be a turning point. It was a very blah game." Several times she hit what appeared to be decent approach shots, only to have them skip long. "I was getting bad bounces it seemed like," said Johns, whose best score this spring was a 78 several weeks ago at Roseburg Country Club. "I was having trouble on the greens. They were fast and don't hold. You had to land everything short." She parred three of the four par 3s, and in one stretch on the back side had four pars in five holes. Particularly impressive were the par-5 12th, which measures 480 yards, and the par-4 14th, both of which she played in textbook fashion. On the former, a booming drive and a wonderful fairway wood left her with only a short iron to the green. She knocked her approach pin high to the center and two-putted. Two holes later, another big drive on the 304-yard hole left her 100 yards out from a back pin placement. She again lofted a fine approach and easily two-putted. It appeared Johns might make a run at Gaston, who double-bogeyed the 12th, for medalist honors, but the Indians senior held it together. "You always want to beat the other person," said Johns, "but she played better than I did, so that's OK." Kinney, who had a 94 the first day and played the front side in 44, ran into trouble twice via hazards on the back nine. She carded an 8 on the par-3 11th hole and a 9 on the par-5 16th. But Kinney crushed her drive on the 17th hole and came in with a par-bogey finish to advance to state by one shot over Grants Pass' Ally Codington and two shots over Eagle Point's Elaina Graham. INDIVIDUAL STATE QUALIFIERS 1, Jennifer Gaston, Roseburg, 172; 2, Stephanie Johns, Ashland, 178; 3, Melissa Carl, Roseburg, 186; 4, Bianca Montagnino, Ashland, 189; 5, Kacie Kinney, North Medford, 192. TEAM STANDINGS ROSEBURG (758) - Jennifer Gaston 84-88-172, Melissa Carl 90-96-186, Heather Warner 99-100-199, Kelly O'Brien 98-103-201. ASHLAND (851) - Stephanie Johns 88-90-178, Bianca Montagnino 97-92-189, Kelly Thompson 105-114-219, Emiko Kimura 134-131-265. GRANTS PASS (884) - Ally Codington 98-95-193, Helen Blauser 111-115-226, Shantel Werner 127-112-239, Brynn Forshay 117 (Thursday)-Kristen Mueller 109 (Friday)-226. NORTH MEDFORD (892) - Kacie Kinney 94-98-192, Chelsea Rettmann 101-110-211, Laurie Johnson 122-121-243, Tabitha Compher 126-120-246. CRATER (903) - Linsy Johnson 106-107-213, Laura Beck 115-106-221, Lacie Oerman 115-108-223, Suzi Campbell 132 (Thursday)-Breauna Inlow 114 (Friday)-246. KLAMATH UNION (925) - Betsy Geraud 102-111-213, Holly Brookshire 111-114-225, Brittany Menefee 128-116-244, Chrissy Blair 132 (Thursday)-Aubrey Eccles 111 (Friday)-243. EAGLE POINT (Incomplete) - Elaina Graham 94-100-194, Stephanie Graham 115-112-227. Reach sports editor Tim Trower at 776-4479, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.