Head Coach: Dave Gragnola
Last year’s record: 4-2-6
Recap: Five of six starters qualified for league finals and placed fourth out of nine teams
Key Matchups: Los Gatos and Monta Vista
Star Players: Senior Sarah Lim, junior Millie Wang and freshman Simran Ahuja
Key losses to graduation: Carine Chan and Tara Natarajan
League: De Anza
Prognosis:
The team has only seven players this season, just shy of the minimum six players required to make a travel team.
For the team’s individual rankings, senior Sarah Lim is ranked No. 1, junior Millie Wang is ranked No. 2 and freshman Simran Ahuja is ranked No. 3. Rounding out the team are seniors Eunice Ching and Lydia Li, junior Stella Cho and sophomore Jacqueline Chico.
Though returning players have qualified for CCS individually in the past, Lim, who has already committed to play golf at Princeton next year, hopes that they will make CCS this year as a team.
“We made it two years ago, and we came really close last year too,” Lim said.
Lim is also optimistic for CCS as Palo Alto — one of the best teams in the league — dropped down to the El Camino League for reasons unknown.
The small roster has also strengthened relationships with one another through team bonding activities. For instance, in August, members of the team hosted a team pool party complete with barbeque and hot dogs along with their coach, Dave Gragnola.
Gragnola believes that the team has a chance to make CCS this year.
“It’s dependent on how we perform but being second best [to Monta Vista] in the league so far, we’ll have a good chance to make it to CCS,” Gragnola said.
Practices take place at the Saratoga Country Golf Club every Monday through Thursday. Players usually practice at the range where they can work on their swing or spend time on the greens for putting practice.
Gragnola has focused practice on teaching players putting proficiency and accurately hitting drives off the tee.
“Saratoga Country Club is a shorter course, but we’ll need to have the driver on longer courses,” Gragnola said. “We try to have a good time during practice with games too.”
As the only freshman on the team, Ahuja has felt like she had an easy transition to high school, thanks to the warm welcome from the upperclassmen. Her goal this season is to improve her swing.
Wang, who has qualified for CCS individually since freshman year, has aspirations to finish as a top player in the league.
“As a team, I hope that we can make it to league finals or even CCS, but individually, I want to work on my game,” Wang said. “We’re hoping to improve from last year.”