Eagles ready for elements at league tournament

Taylor West wasn’t about to let anything stop her, not even a little — OK, a lot — of wind.

The only senior on the Estancia High golf team played a round Sunday with her father at El Prado Golf Course, the setting for the second round of the Golden West League tournament.

The first round starts today at Costa Mesa Country Club.

“That was the worst condition I’ve ever played in,” West said. “Sand and dirt was blowing everywhere. It was intense. But we’re prepared for the worst, so it was cool.”

West is hoping to improve on her fourth-place showing in last year’s tournament, where she finished just behind former teammates Bridget Gleason (second), and Lina You (third). Gleason and You graduated.

Doing well as an individual will give West a chance to make up for the disappointment of Estancia’s team finishing second in league this year to Laguna Beach.

The Eagles’ (13-2, 8-2) only match losses of the season came at the hands of the Breakers, this year’s team league champions.

Estancia lost by just two strokes, 223-221, in the league final.

“I was kind of bummed about it, because I thought we could pull through and maybe tie for first, but we tried our best,” West said. “I wouldn’t have been so upset if we’d lost by a bit more, but a two-stroke difference can mean a lot.”

Still, it’s not a bad finish for a team that lost five seniors last season, according to Coach Art Perry.

“We’ll be the team to beat in the next couple years,” Perry said. “We rebuilt with younger players this year and we were close to being the league champions...I look at it in terms of, we made tremendous strides this year.

“We had a couple of girls that never played who were really beneficial to our program. I was really happy with the outcome, with the way our team progressed.”

Those two players were sophomores Jill Beck and Nushin Tasbihchi, who both played on the soccer team with West. Beck and West also played softball together, and West convinced Beck to play golf instead of trying out for volleyball. Beck and Tasbihchi both finished in the team’s top six during the regular season.

West, Ashley Peters, Kim Haycraft, Jackie Crosson, Tess Hill, and Nicole Irigoyen are the top six girls from Estancia who will competing in the league tournament.

The top 12 overall move on to the second round of competition at El Prado, and the top three in the Golden West advance to CIF individual finals, which are Nov. 1.

“I would like to see at least five of our girls progress to the second day, but we’ll see what happens,” Perry said. “We’ll see what the weather’s like tomorrow. We’ll play in any type of weather. We’ll just wait and see what the weather brings.”

— Soraya Nadia McDonald