Schulze eyeing top prize at section tourney

Mason Schulze of Poway got close enough last spring to view what winning a championship looked like.

He wound up eight shots off the pace set by San Marcos’ Trevor Norby, who was a senior in 2015.

Now a senior, Schulze has one last chance to claim the San Diego Section individual golf championship when the two-day tournament gets underway Tuesday at Admiral Baker Golf Course.

The second and final day is May 19 on the same course.

Carlsbad will be the defending champion.

While Norby was shooting rounds of 70 and 69 for a 139 last year, Schulze checked in with a lackluster 75 the first day and followed that up with a 72 for a total of 147.

“That kind of the way golf is,’’ Schulze said. “The best part of golf is knowing hard work can pay off.

“You’ll have bad days, but you have to learn to stick with your game. You can’t change just because you had a bad round.

“Last big tournament we had I shot a 78 in the first round and then had a 67.’’

Schulze has been playing golf since he was 11 when dad Rick, who worked for Callaway Golf at the time, got him started playing.

Schulze, who will continue his career at Boise State in the fall, was a baseball player at the time and just played golf for fun.

As his golf game improved, baseball slowly went by the wayside.

Before long, Schulze was a fulltime golfer.

Schulze suffered through a slow start this season before finally picking it up and, in his mind, played pretty well.

“I found a groove late in the season,’’ Schulze said. “Good golfers have to have a short memory. You can’t hit a hero shot after a bad one.

“Practice turns into confidence and that turns into trust. It takes a lot of experience to make that work.

“Golf is not a game of perfect.’’

Schulze did say he needs to work on his drivers to keep his tee shots more in the fairway than he’s been doing lately.

“I need some work on just about everything,’’ Schulze said. “Since this is the last CIF, I better make shots count this time.’’

Rancho Bernardo

The Broncos are led by Zihao Jin, who shot a 71-75 for a 146 to qualify for last year’s Southern California Regional.

Coach Richard Deem is counting on Harrison Mahon, Taisei Negishi and Steve Sugimoto along with Jin to make a run at the team title.

Negishi shot a 74-75 for a 149 while Sugimoto had an 84-76 for a 160.

“We had a solid stretch about midseason,’’ Deem said. “We have to not fall apart in CIF like we did last year.

Poway

Besides Schulze in last year’s tournament, the Titans had senior Nathan Gilbert, who had a 76-79 for a 155.

Senior Troy Randle and sophomore John McConnin gained valuable experience in the 2015 tournament.

Del Norte

The Wangs are leading the Nighthawks.

Sophomore Michael Wang had a 75-77 for a 152 in last year’s tournament. Senior Chris Wang is also back.

Monahan is a freelance writer.