AURORA | City teams and athletes won one team state championship and 11 individual titles during the final weeks of the 2017 spring prep sports season. Here’s an in-depth look at Grandview sophomore Amy Chitkoksoong, the Class 5A girls state golf champion:
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at 303-750-7555 or [email protected] Twitter: @aurorasports. FB: Aurora Prep Sentinel
GRANDVIEW’S AMY CHITKOKSOONG: 5A GIRLS GOLF STATE CHAMPION
In the final event of the spring prep sports season involving Aurora, sophomore Amy Chitkoksoong came away with her first career Class 5A girls state golf championship and the first for coach Mary Danielson’s Grandview program. The Centennial League individual champion started the season slow, but found her form in the weeks going into the state tournament. Frustrated after the first day of the Class 5A girls state golf tournament on the challenging course at The Club at Rolling Hills in Golden — where fast greens, many with significant slopes, caused all sorts of havoc with putts — Chitkoksoong missed her “target” score and found herself in fifth place after the opening round at 6-over-par. She still had some positives in the opening round with three birdies and she had two on her opening nine holes in the second round as well. Chitkoksoong didn’t exactly light it up on the back nine — she shot 3-over-par — but she played steady enough that her 4-over-par 76 eventually brought her in at 10-over-par along with Highlands Ranch’s Jenna Chun. Rock Canyon’s Amelia Lee had the same score with two holes left to play, but a bogey dropped her out of a share of the lead, leaving Chitkoksoong and Chun to go to a playoff to decide the state championship.
Teammates Caitlin O’Donnell, Morgan Ryan and Sharae Lewis — who combined to give Grandview a third-place team finish — kept the mood light before the playoff, which began on Hole No. 10. With a large gallery in tow, Chitkoksoong and Chun virtually mirrored each other over two playoff holes, with Chun coming up short on a putt to win it on No. 11. Chitkoksoong had made bogeys on the par-4 Hole No. 12 in each of the first two rounds and she finished with a bogey again in the playoff — following up a nice chip from the rough above the green with two putts — but this time it was enough to win the championship as Chun made a double bogey.
Chitkoksoong finished second last season as she helped Grandview win the first state golf title in program history and kept the 5A individual state title in Aurora as she followed Regis Jesuit’s Mary Weinstein, the 2016 champion.
MORE WE ARE THE (AURORA) CHAMPIONS
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview girls track team (5A state track)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview’s Brie Oakley (5A girls 3,200 meters)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Cherokee Trail’s Sydnee Larkin (5A girls triple jump)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Hinkley’s Darrien Wells (5A boys 400 meters)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview’s Kylee Harr (5A girls high jump)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Hinkley’s Angel Heredia (5A boys 300 meter hurdles)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Cherokee Trail’s Jaiden Paris, Taylor Watson, Chian DeLoach, Sydnee Larkin (5A girls 4×100 meter relay)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview’s Kennede Brown, Kameryn Brown, Lily Williams and Michaela Onyenwere (5A girls 4×200 meter relay)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Hinkley’s Casey Sharpe, Oscar Sarabia, Angel Heredia and Darrien Wells (5A boys 4×200 meter relay)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview’s Kylee Harr, Jordyn Moore, Kameryn Brown and Lily Williams (5A girls 800 meter sprint medley relay)
We are the (Aurora) champions: Grandview’s Lily Williams, Kaitlyn Mercer, Kennede Brown and Michaela Onyenwere (5A girls 4×400 meter relay)
