Woodberry Forest Golf: 5/24/15

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Season summary

Coaches: Marc Hogan, David Smith

Captains: Hawk Swearingen ’15, Peter Knade ’16

Record: 1^st in Prep League, 2^nd in State

Individual Honors: All-Prep Peter Knade, Hawk Swearingen ’15, Teddy Garner ’16, Charles Hargrove ’17, Mac Boney ’18 All-State Mac Boney and Basil Boyd ’17

The 2015 Woodberry Forest golf campaign began with thirty-seven students, a record number, trying out for the varsity team during the last snowy weeks of February. Coaches Marc Hogan and David Smith settled on a group of twenty-three players who battled all season for the coveted six match spots. Weekly qualifying rounds meant a different group played in each match.

An opening tie with St. Christopher’s at home was followed by victories at Trinity Episcopal School, over St. Paul’s School in the Disharoon Cup, and at St. Anne’s-Belfield School. The Tigers lost by a single stroke at Collegiate, but got revenge over Cougars at home the following week. To close the season, Woodberry won handily over Georgetown Prep, lost at St. Christopher’s School, and bested Episcopal High School to finish with a 6-2-1 record.

The Tigers were not favored in the Prep League tournament even though they had won the three previous championships. Playing their best golf in windy and warm conditions, Woodberry prevailed over previously undefeated St. Chris and the other VPL teams to garner its twenty-eighth league title at The Federal Club in Glen Allen. Peter Knade ’16 (71) successfully defended his individual championship. Peter, Hawk Swearingen ’15 (76), Teddy Garner ’16 (80), Charles Hargrove ’17 (80), and Mac Boney ’18 (81) earned All-Prep honors.

The next week, the Tigers finished second at the VISAA state championship at The Manor in Farmville to St. Chris, 297-303. Mac (76) and Basil Boyd ’17 (73) garnered All-State honors.

Peter, the team’s co-captain, won the William H. White Golf Trophy for low stroke average, and Charles won the Thomas Bond MVP Award for his overall play. Hawk finished his WFS career by winning the Sam A. Dougherty Golf Prize for his outstanding play and leadership as a co-captain.

Ten golfers finished with stroke averages below eighty, and eleven of the top twelve golfers return for the 2016 season, promising another season of excellence going into the future.

Golf Facilities

Our golf facilities are unmatched. The only high school in Virginia with its own course, Woodberry plays its home matches on a nine-hole golf course designed in 1926 by Donald Ross. We also have the Graves Golf Practice Area, built in 1991, which has a driving range, two practice greens and sand bunkers. With our Doppler-based TrackMan launch monitors, we can track each player’s clubhead speed, ball speed, launch angle, and carry distance. We can then use this data to test different equipment. Our indoor putting green allows us to practice putting and short-game skills in any weather.

Coach’s Corner: Varsity Golf Coach Marc Hogan

Of the campus’s many resources, the school’s golf facilities truly set it apart. With a nine-hole Donald Ross-designed golf course and a range of other amenities for the teaching of golf, Woodberry is poised to nurture the young golfer. And no one is more suited to bring together the promising golfers who choose Woodberry Forest with traditional techniques honed at the Graves Practice Area and modern-day technological tools installed in the Squash Pavilion than Marc Hogan.

Having worked with the golf program for over twenty years, Marc holds a Level III golf teaching certification from the United States Golf Teachers' Federation and a Level I golf fitness instructor certification from the Titleist Performance Institute. He was the first coach certified in the DECADE course management system, which teaches players course strategy. His contributions to the game have been honored by the Virginia Prep League, which has named him Coach of the Year nine times, and by VISAA, which has awarded him the title six times.

As he does in his English classroom, Marc embraces technology in the teaching of golf. With particular support from Mitch Hull ’77 and past parents Hallie and Ed Pettegrew, as well as an anonymous gift, the school has video-recording devices, computers, and three launch monitors that analyze a player’s stroke and help him match it to swings used by the world’s most successful golfers.

Marc is a Greensboro, North Carolina, native and earned his BA and MA from the University of Virginia. He has taught English at Woodberry Forest since 1987. A scratch golfer, Marc has qualified for the Virginia Senior Amateur Championship six times and made match play four times in 2017, 2019 (round of 16), 2020, and 2021. He has also qualified for the VSGA Amateur Championship in 2021 and 2022. He lives in the Rapp House with his wife Linda, who works in Culpeper. They have three daughters, Miranda, who lives and works in Staunton; Anna Grey ’14, who lives and works in Charlottesville; and Cordelia '17, who lives and works in Charlotte.