Chesnee’s Sydney Roberts shot a career best round and so did Ella Stalvey for Blythewood at the Lady Rebel Invitational.

Roberts 7-under par 65 earned her medalist honors and Stalvey’s 67 helped the Bengals win the team championship.

The tournament at River Falls Plantation had been postponed twice earlier in the season. Once for COVID concerns and another time for bad weather.

On Thursday, the weather was perfect, masks were in abundance and scoring conditions on the course allowed Roberts, Stalvey and a handful of other golfers to record personal best scores within the tournament.

Roberts has been near the top of several tournaments this fall. At the Lady Rebel she finally got her putter going and that helped produce a round with no bogeys.

“I just got tired of putting bad,” Roberts said. “Today I putted really well. I only had to scramble for a par once,” she said.

Roberts took some pressure off her putter with good approach shots into the greens. The Eagle’s golfer almost aced a pair of holes in the tournament.

“On number 6, I might have been three or four inches from the hole. On number 16, my ball hit about an inch from the hole and rolled past, but both were pretty close to going in,” she said.

The 7-under par 65 was carded without taking advantage of the par 5s at River Falls.

“I was only able to birdie one of the par 5s. I wish I could have played those a little better,” she said.

Blythewood’s Stalvey also recorded a personal best by shooting a 67 finishing under 70 for the first time.

“I’ve shot lower than 70, but not in tournaments,” said Stalvey. “I played well, but it wasn’t as good at it should have been,” she said.

The Bengals’ golfer made 6-birdies. She eagled a hole when she drove the green, but she also suffered one big number when she hit a tee shot out of bounds.

Stalvey finished at 5-under par 67, 2-shots behind Roberts.

The 296 score for the winning Blythewood team was its best score so far this year.

“We are right where we want to be at this point in the season,” said Blythewood coach Jason Minkel. “This was our best score in a tournament this year and our number one and number five players had personal bests,” he noted.

The defending AAAAA champions are tuning up for a run at another state title and that means another head to head battle with Lexington.

“We’ve finished first, second and third in tournaments we have played with Lexington. We have a lot of experience on our team without having any seniors. We’re looking forward to the playoffs,” said the Bengals coach.

While there may be other teams that emerge as challengers for the AAAAA title, but tournament results so far this year indicate it likely is a two team race.

Lexington is at the top of both the AAAAA coaches poll and the composite poll of all classifications.

The Wildcats have been helped by the return of Isabella Rawl the 2018 AAAAA individual champion. Rawl missed all of last year with an injury.

Chesnee claimed second place in the team competition with a 315 score to finish 3-shots in front of its AAA-AA-A rival from fourth place Gilbert.

“While we wanted to win the tournament I’m pretty happy with our finish,” said Chesnee coach Kyle Scruggs. “What I am watching is how we compare with Gilbert. We have been able to stay in front of them this year, but it is always close,” he added.

Chesnee was the runner-up in the classification last year.

The Eagles are in the Upper State while Gilbert is in the Lower State creating the possibility of the two teams battling for the state title later in October.

“There are other good teams in our classification this year. Daniel was a state champion last year and I’m sure there are good teams in the lower part of the state,” said Scruggs.

Teams begin Region tournaments and then Upper and Lower State qualifying tournaments for state championship play that is scheduled at various sites around October 25-26-27th.

The Lady Rebel All-Tournament team included Sidney Roberts 65, Chesnee, Ella Stalvey 67, Blythewood, MK Talledo 70, Boiling Springs, Coutney Collins 70 Daniel, Kennedy Gooding 71, Gilbert, Buggy Reinke 72, Legion Collegiate.

Team totals 1-Blythewood 296, 2-Chesnee 315, 3-Gilbert 318, 4-Byrnes (A) 330, 5-Legion 333, 6-Dorman 334, 7 Daniel 339, 8-Boiling Springs 351, 9-Spartanburg 358, 10-Gaffney 374.