Daily Journal Girls’ Golfer of the Year: Hillsdale’s Kayla Corcoran

And Corcoran certainly went out and took the award. She had the low round seven times in 10 matches — five of those times she had the low round outright. Corcoran then went out and overcame a two-shot deficit over the final three holes to capture the Peninsula Athletic League individual championship and followed that with a tie for 14th place at the Central Coast Section championship.

“She doesn’t just play golf. She’s a golfer,” Hillsdale head coach Dave Godoy said. “We had two golfers on the team. She saw you can put in hard work and still have fun.”

Corcoran is no newcomer to the game. She said she’s been playing golf for as long as she can remember. Her dad introduced her to the game really young and she started playing junior tournaments when she was 7 years old.

And it’s only ever been golf.

“My dad originally showed me the game and I was just doing that for fun,” Corcoran said. “Then I started doing tournaments and found tournaments were fun. Then you just want to get better. I went through phases of, ‘Let me try this (other sport).’ I think I might have tried soccer one summer.”

Her passion for the game led the family to investing in a high-end golf simulator at home.

“We’ve had it for four years,” said Chris Corcoran, Kayla’s father. “We really never go to the driving range. A bucket (of balls) is like 20 bucks now. It eventually pays for itself.”

But she was unfamiliar with high school golf, which is different from tournament golf.

Regular-season high school rounds are only nine holes. Tournaments play 18 holes over multiple days. Then there is the team aspect of high school golf. Corcoran could shoot the low round of the day, but the team could still lose.

“I didn’t know what to expect,” Corcoran said. “It turned out to be a lot funner than I thought.”

Making it even more fun is when you’re good at playing golf, and Corcoran is. In her first-ever match for the Knights, she shared low-round honors as she carded 1-over 36 at Poplar Creek Golf Course in San Mateo.

She tied for the lowest round in the second match before Corcoran had the lowest score in the next two matches — beating Johnson in match No. 4.

“They were back and forth on who was going to be medalist, but Kayla kept up with [Johnson],” Godoy said. “Once [Corcoran] realized she could compete with [Johnson], it was time to go off.”

Corcoran said playing with Johnson, who will play college golf at Division III power George Fox University-Oregon next spring, kept her on her toes and gave her someone to not only learn from but omeone to which to aspire.

“She definitely helped me stay focused to try to compete with her,” Corcoran said. “I was aware that Ashlyn and I would be neck-and-neck for (lowest) scores.”

Despite the quick start to her high school career, Corcoran is not really surprised. She is used to going low and used to having success on the golf course.

“She’s not the biggest kid, but she hits bombs (0ff the tee),” Godoy said.

Corcoran said her average yardage with her driver is between 220 and 240 yards.

“Her short game is money,” Godoy said. “She’s a fighter. She’s a competitor.”

By the time the PAL individual championship came around — a one-round, 18-hole match at Poplar Creek — the Hillsdale pair were the top two seeds: Johnson, seeded No. 1, had a differential of 2.8. Corcoran was seeded No. 2 with a differential of 2.0.

Corcoran played in the group behind Johnson, so she had no idea what the scores were, so Corcoran just kept plugging along. She trailed by two shots as she entered the final three holes. She had back-to-back pars on 16 and 17 and finished with a bogey on the 18th.

Corcoran didn’t know that Johnson’s putter failed her down the stretch and didn’t know she had passed her until she turned in her scorecard at the end of the round.

Corcoran posted a 6-over 77. Johnson was two shots back. No one came in with a better score and Corcoran was the newest PAL champion, defeating the two-time champ in the process.

“I expected to be close to Ashlyn, maybe a little below her,” Corcoran said. “But I didn’t really expect to beat her. I was really surprised.”

That win qualified Corcoran for the CCS tournament where she finished with a 4-over 75 at Rancho Seca Golf Ranch in Monterey, which tied for 14th and tied for the highest finish among San Mateo County golfers, with Crystal’s Claire Zhong.

She missed out on a playoff by a stroke that determined the final transfer spot to the Northern California regional tournament.

“That was a great experience for her,” Godoy said. “She missed a putt or two, but it’s a great start to CCS.”

While the high school season over, Corcoran is already busy preparing for the summer tournament season and her sophomore year at Hillsdale.

“She’s going to get bigger. She’s going to get stronger,” Godoy said. “I told her, ‘Ashlyn has passed the torch and the team is yours now.’”