The Jamestown Community College golf team opened its season Friday at the Tompkins Cortland Community College Invitational. Pictured, from left, are: Maxim Johnson, Athanasios Bakas, Austyn Cummings, Traden Gray, Brady Fye, Noah Adams and Anthony Gullo. Submitted photo

There are high goals going into the upcoming season for the Jamestown Community College golf team as the Jayhawks return three golfers that have competed for the program in some capacity over the past two seasons.

“It’s nice to have veterans out on the course,” said head coach George Sisson. “There’s a difference in seeing the course for a second time compared to seeing it for the first time coming off the van.”

Jamestown CC returns Traden Gray (Frewsburg/Frewsburg CS), Noah Adams (Mayville/Chautauqua Lake CS) and Anthony Gullo (Jamestown/Jamestown HS) after taking a year off.

Gray put together a fine freshman season a year ago, finishing with a pair of top-five finishes including a first-place finish at the Jayhawk Invitational at Chautauqua Golf Club. At regionals, Gray was named to the NJCAA Region 3 All-Region team with a fifth-place finish after the two-day event.

Two seasons ago, Gullo led the Jayhawks with three first-place finishes including the Tompkins Cortland CC Invitational, SUNY Adirondack CC Invitational and Jefferson CC Invitational. At regionals, Gullo finished in fourth place to earn NJCAA Region 3 All-Region honors.

“Traden and Anthony have shown what they can do on these courses that we will compete at this season,” Sisson said. “Noah showed tremendous growth over the past season where he was bale to shave 20 strokes off his game so it will be nice to have these guys back.”

Joining the returners this season will be freshmen Austyn Cummings (Warren, Pa./Warren Area HS), Brady Fye (Lakewood/Southwestern CS), Athanasios Bakas (North Riding, Johannesburg, South Africa/The King’s College and Preparatory School) and Maxim Johnson (Johannesburg, South Africa/King Edwards VII School).

“Austyn is an older guy coming in who has golfed in leagues over the past few years but will be his first time competing at this level,” said Sisson. “Brady has some distance and has shown us some good things in the preseason. Anthanasios competed this past fall in some tournaments and has shown to be a formidable golfer to go along with Maxim who has also shown to strike the ball very well for us.”

The Jayhawks started the season at the Tompkins Cortland CC Invitational on Friday and will play at the Onondaga CC Invitational today. The second week of the season will consist of three golf outings at Mohawk Valley CC Invitational (April 21), SUNY Adirondack CC Invitational (April 22) and the Hudson Valley CC Invitational (April 23).

Jamestown CC will host the Jayhawk Invitational on April 28 and then travel to the Niagara County CC Invitational the following day. The Jayhawks wrap up the regular season at the Jefferson CC Invitational (May 5) and Herkimer College Invitational (May 7).

“We have as good of a team in my estimate as we’ve had in recent memory,” Sisson said. “Not only do we have guys that can compete individually, but we also have guys that will make us competitive on the team side.”

After the regular season, the Jayhawks will look to the postseason and will compete at the NJCAA Region 3 Championships on May 15-16 at Glen Oak Golf Course hosted by Niagara County CC. There, JCC will prepare for the NJCAA Division III Men’s Golf National Championships at Chautauqua Golf Club from June 6-9, an event that the institution has hosted since the 1999 season.

“Our nationals are one of two golf championships that have a 72-hole tournament,” said Sisson. “Us traveling and playing back-to-backs, or in some cases three days in a row, will help build us up for the end of the year.”

For nationals, the Jayhawks get the automatic qualifier for being the host institution, but coach Sisson sees a different mentality in his golfers for this season.

“It’s nice that we get the automatic qualifier but our mentality this year will be to compete week in and week out,” he said. “I really believe that we have guys that can challenge for medalist every week but also be toward the top in the team scoring as well.”