Liberty defeats defending state champ Xavier to win D-I girls high school golf title
Peoria Liberty High School's girls golf team won its first Division I girls golf title on Tuesday, edging defending champion Xavier at Omni Tucson National golf course.
Liberty, which placed fifth last year, took the lead on day one of the tournament and secured the state championship win on Tuesday, finishing with an overall two-day team score of 593.
“It’s pretty special and these girls have been playing golf for a really long time, one of the things I told them is that you’ve done all the little things and now it’s just time to finish,” said Kyle Pooler, Liberty's head coach.
Xavier trailed Liberty by just three stokes after Monday's opening round and Hamilton, in third, was seven strokes behind Xavier.
“On day one I think the lead changed like 15 times, it continued to flip flop all day long and we came in on top after day one but we didn't feel really good about our day,” Pooler said.
Pinnacle finsihed 20 strokes behind Liberty in fourth overall. Pinnacle was runner-up to Xavier last year and in 2018, but won the championship in 2019, the only school to defeat Xavier in the girls championship since 2011 before Tuesday, according to AIA records.
Boulder Creek rounded out the top 5, four strokes behind Pinnacle.
With all four teams within a few stokes of each other after the first day, the state championship was still up for grabs.
Xavier shot just one stoke behind Liberty in Tuesday's second round, but ultimately fell short of winning consecutive state championships.
Individually, Hamilton's Jennifer Seo scored a total of 134, 8-under-par to put her as the No.1 player of the tournament. Right behind her was Liberty's, Mattie Frick, with a total of 138. Coming in third was Pinnacle's Carolyn Fuller with a total of 140.
"Mattie Frick state champion last year and she wanted to repeat, and I think Jennifer from Hamilton is just unbelievable, she was just on fire," Pooler said. "On day two, Mattie was still trying to catch her and at some point Mattie just flipped a switch internally and stopped worry about trying to catch her and played for her team."
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Liberty tops Xavier in D-I girls high school golf championship
