Girls golf preview: 5A could be ‘wide open’ with Coronado rebuilding
Coronado’s girls golf team has been dominant in recent years, running away with the last three Class 5A state titles.
Opponents may have a glimmer of hope this season.
The Cougars have lost some key pieces heading into the high school sports fall schedule, which begins Thursday. Longtime coach Joe Sawaia retired after the team’s 2023 state title and assistant Rusty Andersen is taking over the program. Andersen, who guided Coronado’s boys team to the 2021 and 2023 state titles, said the Cougars’ girls team will be a young squad with three freshmen.
“It’s a pretty new group with only two of the returning players, so it’s just kind of starting over,” Andersen said. “We know there’s a standard that the girls before have set and that’s not going to change.”
Sophia Medlin — an All-Southern Nevada second team selection who finished seventh in the 5A Desert League regular-season standings last year — is Coronado’s top returning golfer. Berlin Biddinger, who finished ninth in the regular-season standings, is also back.
“We’re going to rebuild, try to reload, but it’s a good opportunity for some of those younger girls to step into the spotlight,” Andersen said. “We’re just trying to focus on the things we can control.”
Andersen said both Palo Verde and Faith Lutheran will have good teams this season. He also expects Bishop Gorman and Clark, which finished second to Coronado at last year’s state tournament, to be competitive.
“There’ve been some really good teams that probably didn’t get the notoriety because we’ve had such a strong team,” Andersen said. “They were just overpowering. It’s going to be more wide open than it has been in quite a while this year.”
With 5A being Southern-only, 4A Southern schools face the top Northern schools for the 4A state title. Foothill was the only Southern team to qualify for last year’s state tournament. Northern champion Bishop Manogue won the team state title by 90 strokes.
The Meadows won the 3A state title by 59 strokes over Virgin Valley. It was the third straight team title for The Meadows, which won the 2A team titles in 2021 and 2022.
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
