Cardinal Mooney boys golf's lefties have the team rolling

Man, it’s a hot one.

If you turned on a radio sometime between 1999 and, let’s say, 2005, you might recognize the previous sentence as the opening line of “Smooth,” the song by Santana and featuring Matchbox 20 vocalist Rob Thomas that held the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 for 12 weeks. Today, if you frequent Twitter or other dark corners of the internet, you’ll know that the song has morphed into a meme, ridiculed for its lyrics (the previous line is followed by “... like seven inches from the midday sun,” so it’s somewhat deserved. Yes, this is a sports column, why do you ask?).

I haven’t pressed play on the song in years, but it was stuck in my head as I was leaving Laurel Oak Country Club on Sept. 26. There are a few reasons for that. The first, well, it truly was a hot one, and I was counting the minutes until I could change my shirt. The second had less to do with temperature and more with the Cardinal Mooney boys golf team.

The Cougars’ swings were just so smooth.

Especially compared to my own swing, which is best visualized as a sputtering wind-up robot trying to use a broom.

Watching them tee off, I started to get an understanding of why the team is undefeated (9-0) in nine-hole play. It’s a team led by senior captain Kyle Jarrett and two sophomores, Robbie Higgins and Noah Kumar. All three play left-handed, which I found more interesting than they did. It’s not any more or less challenging to play golf as a lefty, Jarrett said, but it’s a cool thread connecting the team’s top guys.  

Their swings may have come naturally, but their success is also a product of hard work. During Hurricane Irma, the team lost practice time because of closed courses. Kumar wasn’t having that, though. He set up a net in his back yard and pounded shot after shot into it. Higgins, too, practiced on his own, because that’s all he could do.

Cardinal Mooney has relished its sweet start in part because it was unexpected. Both Kumar and Higgins said the team had no real expectations coming into the year. Jarrett said this is “by far” the best start the Cougars have had in his time at the school. The emergence of the sophomores and the leadership of the senior has led to greater things than they could have imagined. It’s a chummy group, too. All three players noted their chemistry as a determining factor in their success. Some of their favorite moments are in practice when they get to compete against each other in match play or some other golf game. They are also high school boys, so there’s some ribbing too, usually involving those new to the team. It’s always good-natured, they said.

Golf is fickle and hard to predict, but I think Cardinal Mooney’s early-season success will continue. It’s a deep program talent-wise, and that talent is diverse. Higgins said the team’s strength is ball striking, meaning the ability to control the flight of the ball as desired, while Kumar said it’s driving. All of the team’s top players can hit long, he said, allowing the team to play different areas of the course than other teams.

How far can those abilities take them?

“As far as we want to go,” Kumar said. “We can do anything. A lot of it is mental. We have all the talent in the world.”

In other words, make it real, or else forget about it.

Great, now I’m quoting “Smooth” again.

Anyone know how to get a song out of your head? Thanks in advance.