KINGSTON, N.Y. \u2014 It has been a short break for the Kingston High boys golf team. Just months after completing the 2025 campaign with a successful spring season, the Tigers are back at it again with a late summer start versus Goshen on Wednesday, Sept. 2 at the Stony Ford Golf Course at Campbell Hall.<\/p>\n
The Orange County Interscholastic Athletic Association (OCIAA) transitioned high school boys golf from a spring sport to a fall sport starting this season. Kingston is a longtime OCIAA member.<\/p>\n
Kingston High coach Juan Weissenberg feels his players will benefit from the change.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of the guys who\u2019ve been on the team played all summer,\u201d Weissenberg said. \u201cMind you they played in the winter in the indoor simulators prior to the spring season. But it\u2019s definitely an advantage to have this nice weather to start the season.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another benefit to the change in schedule is Kingston can now schedule Mid-Hudson Athletic League (MHAL) teams who play in the fall.<\/p>\n
The Tigers will host MHAL schools Saugerties and Rondout Valley on Friday, Sept. 4 at the Wiltwyck Golf Club in a triangular match. Ty Monroe of Saugerties and Hokai Liu of Rondout Valley both qualified for the New York State Public High School Athletic Association (NYSPHSAA) Boys High School Championship in 2025. Monroe finished in a tie for 14th.<\/p>\n
The only disadvantage to the fall change is that the courses the OCIAA teams will now compete on are still finishing up leagues and outings, Weissenberg said. And the courses figure to also still have a lot of play from paying customers or members of clubs due to the good weather.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s made scheduling matches a little more difficult,\u201d Weissenberg said. \u201cBut we\u2019ll figure that stuff out. I\u2019m just happy the guys feel comfortable with their games to start the season.\u201d<\/p>\n
The OCIAA change was made because cold weather often delayed the start of the season for couple of weeks.<\/p>\n
Kingston\u2019s Austin Hand and Andre Miller, who are both left-handed golfers, both hope they can qualify for the state championship for the first time in their senior seasons.<\/p>\n
Weissenberg is confident they will have a good opportunity to do so. The top nine golfers in the Section 9 tournament will qualify for the states in June 2027. The sectional tournament will be held on the Monster Golf Club at the Resorts World Catskills in Monticello.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve both been on the golf team for four years,\u201d Weissenberg said. \u201cAustin (Hand) made it to day two of sectionals last year and only missed it (states) by five strokes. He finished 13th last year, so with graduates and getting a little bit better I think he has a real chance. I think he\u2019s ready. Andre (Miller) also made it to sectionals, but missed day two. But he\u2019s just as solid as it comes and he keeps getting better and better. I hope he can keep it together and get to day two because I think he has a shot and has the game to finish in the top nine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hand likes that the Tigers will be playing fall golf this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s an advantage by getting many rounds in over the summer before the season starts instead of playing indoors before the (spring) season,\u201d Hand said.<\/p>\n
Miller knows this is his last chance to qualify for states.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been chasing that one for four years now,\u201d Miller said. \u201cIt was a bit of a letdown last year that I didn\u2019t make it, but I just want to play solid all year to give myself the best chance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sophomore Jameson Beesmer is Kingston\u2019s other returning golfer from the squad that had an 11-3 dual meet record. He feels fortunate to be able to learn certain things about the game from Hand and Miller.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to follow their lead and keep hitting it further and shooting lower scores,\u201d Beesmer said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s also been on the team for four years,\u201d Weissenberg said of Beesmer. \u201cHe\u2019s been on the team since the seventh grade. He feels like he\u2019s a senior since he came in at the same time as Austin and Andre. He made it to the OCIAAs the last couple of years, so I\u2019m hoping he can get to sectionals by kind of riding on these guys\u2019 coattails, seeing how they practice and competing against them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weissenberg said he has five other players who all have a shot to join Hand, Miller and Beesmer in the starting lineup.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re early in the season and we\u2019ve only had a few rounds in, but they\u2019re pretty close to the same,\u201d Weissenberg said. \u201cIt\u2019ll be fun to see who kind of emerges. We\u2019ll probably be rotating players in and out to see what we have. Some guys step up under pressure, while some guys still need a little more time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although the Tigers lost Antonio Cecelia, Mark Lekaj and Sean Woolsey to graduation, Weissenberg thinks Kingston can still be competitive in the OCIAA.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had three rounds last year where all six players shot in the 40s,\u201d Weissenberg said. \u201cI think that\u2019s behind us this year. But we have three solid players and if we can get the other guys to shoot in the low 50s, you can pretty much compete with anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n
The OCIAA Championship will be held Oct. 13 at the Powelton Club at Newburgh and the two-day Section 9 Championship will follow Oct. 20 and 21 at the Monster Golf Club.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KINGSTON, N.Y. \u2014 It has been a short break for the Kingston High boys golf team. Just months…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58025,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[44,898,913,56,914],"class_list":["post-58024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-golf","tag-latest-headlines","tag-new-york","tag-sports","tag-ulster-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58024"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58024\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58025"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}