Blackmore, Heuer Are First Mariners To Win Sebonack Challenge Since 2016

The Sebonack Challenge Championship Plaque resides once again in Southampton.

For five years, pairings from Westhampton Beach had laid claim to the best-ball formatted tournament that includes the top players from the four Southampton Town school teams — Hampton Bays, Pierson, Southampton and Westhampton Beach — and brings them together for a late-season, competitive match that has taken place since 2010. Zach Berger, a sophomore, and Owen Jessop, a junior, were the reigning champions trying to retain the Sebonack title, but it was Southampton senior Liam Blackmore and sophomore Ethan Heuer who wound up taking it, shooting a seven-under, two shots ahead of the Hurricane pair.

Blackmore and Heuer are the first Mariners to win Sebonack since Christian Oakley and Andrew Wesnofske won it in 2016, which was the third straight year Southampton had won. It marks the sixth year that Southampton had won Sebonack, the most by any school — it shared the very first title with Hampton Bays in 2010.

“They’re a pretty good squad, it was tough, but I think once we got to square on 9, that’s kind of where we got it going,” said Blackmore, who was playing in the tournament for the second year. “I think once we got the lead on 11, I don’t think we backed down. I hit a bad shot, [Ethan] hit a good shot. Or he hit a bad shot, I hit a good shot. We hammed and egged it pretty good out there.”

Southampton head coach Tim Schreck said it’s rare when a high school golf match or tournament can be likened to a heavyweight boxing match, where one team lands a hard punch and the other responds with an equally hard punch, but that’s really what it was, or became. After Blackmore and Heuer, caddied by teammates Sam Conklin and Colin DeLalio, bogied the first hole, it kind of woke them up and they each started to trade one good hole for one bad hole. Trailing by a shot going into the ninth hole, Blackmore chipped in a shot for eagle to tie with Berger and Jessop, caddied by Dagney Beasley and Nick Borusso at two-under par.

Hampton Bays and Pierson played the first nine holes together. Senior Baymen Erik Sandstrom and Michael Poremba, caddied by teammates Rieve Nydegger and Matt Luce, held a two shot lead (five-over) over Whalers Adam Drohan, a junior, and Carter Kleinsmith, a senior, who were caddied by teammates Harry Ambrose and Mason Wheeler, respectively. Sandstrom and Poremba wound up finishing third with an 80, three shots ahead of Drohan and Kleinsmith.

With Blackmore and Heuer and Berger and Jessop the clear frontrunners, the pairings remained the same on the back nine, which is when some of the hard-hitting shots really started. Jessop birdied 14, and with the sun rapidly going down, one shot could make the difference. But Blackmore also birdied 14 to keep things even. On the next hole, though, Heuer eagled, and even though Jessop birdied, Southampton took a one shot advantage. It would stay that way until the 18th and final hole, when Heuer birdied to put the Mariners up two shots and recorded a new tournament record of seven-under.

Heuer had never actually played in the Sebonack Challenge before, but he did caddie for Blackmore last year, which he said helped a bit.

“We felt we came into this the underdogs with obviously nothing to lose, so we were just giving it our best. If we lose, we lose,” he said. “I know Owen is a plus-three handicap, they’re the reigning champs, they won last year. Like Liam said, we had alternating bad holes and good holes. I started out not that great, but then he got going, and then I started to pick it up a bit. When he chipped it in on nine for eagle, I think that was really the turning point.”

“I think on the front nine, we had a lot of scramble pars, dropping a lot of putts, but it was toward the back nine where we started taping in shots for birdies and pars, putting the pressure on them,” Blackmore added.

Schreck said Blackmore and Heuer have been playing great of late, so it wasn’t too much of a surprise that they won.

“Ethan has really come on strong the last five matches. Liam has been ready since day one of the season. He had a great summer and a great season all around,” he said. “But I think they all really peaked at all the right moments and pulled out a lot of shots when they got in trouble. I’m not going to say they’ve been doing that all year, but Friday was a culminating event where everything was clicking.”

Westhampton Beach head coach Fred Musumeci gave credit where it was due.

“It’s disappointing we didn’t win it after having won it five years in a row, but both teams played amazing high school golf,” he said. “You have to give credit to Southampton. Their kids had to make every shot and every putt down the stretch and they did, they earned it. Both teams went back and forth and just played amazing golf in tough conditions.”

Musumeci admitted it was frustrating for him to see Blackmore and Heuer match his players, but that’s just the way the sport is.

“My kids understand competition golf,” he said. “You can’t let your opponent and what they’re doing bother you. You have to continue to make shots, and they did all day. At the end of the day, you’re playing against yourselves and the course and they left it all out there.”

Sebonack went kind of hand in hand with how the regular season finished up. Southampton, for the second straight year, won the League VIII title with an unblemished 10-0 record. East Hampton and Westhampton Beach wound up tying for second place, with identical 7-3 records, while Pierson finished fourth with a 4-6 record. Mere shots separated the ’Canes and Mariners when the two teams played in Southampton on October 10, when the Mariners won, 190-192.

“You know how the season typically goes in the beginning, but once we started to play two matches a week and get into a rhythm, and we also started out this season at home, which is a rarity for us,” Schreck said of his team’s regular season. “And then we beat East Hampton on their home course and that kind of gave us some good momentum. Then we beat Westhampton on their course, which is never easy to do, and that put us in the driver’s seat. We had to play East Hampton again, and we beat them by one stroke, and then we finished up the league by beating Westhampton by two strokes, so the matches were incredibly close, especially the second time around.

“I think the back end of everyone’s lineup was in question coming into the season, and I think our four, five and six played outstanding,” he continued. “Every match we had someone stepping up and we were throwing out someone else’s score each match. This is probably the most complete team I’ve had in a while. Liam and Ethan are two studs, but the bottom of the lineup shined at different times of the season and it was a complete team effort.

Musumeci said his team wasn’t playing all that well in the middle of the season, but that it is starting to peak at the right time.

“I like where we’re at right now,” he said. “In the middle of the season, we collectively weren’t playing that great. But that’s all behind us. We’re looking to go on a similar run to last year, when we made it all the way to the county final of the team tournament. If you look at our scores from last year, they’re all better this year and I think we’re peaking at the right time.”

The Conference IV Championships were played Monday at Spring Lake Golf Club in Middle Island (see separate story). The Section IX Individual Championships start this Monday, October 23, back at Spring Lake and will finish the following day. The county team tournament is then expected to tentatively start on October 26.