To say the SMUS Blue Jags came through in the clutch to win the provincial BC AA Golf Championship in Langley this week, Jun. 1–3, would be an understatement.
All the Blue Jags did was overcome a four-shot deficit in the final round and overtake two very highly rated teams to capture the first provincial golf title in school history.
“It’s the biggest stage for high school golf — the final round of the provincial tournament,” said SMUS Head Coach Steve Bates, “and these guys were up to the moment.”
They certainly were. All five SMUS team members for the BC tournament shot final-round scores in the 70s to vault the Blue Jags into a first-place finish, four strokes ahead of runner-up and defending champion Mulgrave, and eight shots in front of first-day leader Mennonite Educational Institute.
Grade 10 Jeff Su led SMUS on the final day, shooting a 2-over-par 73 on The Redwoods course. His teammates were very close behind, with Grade 12 Sting Zhang and Grade 11 Ricardo Chen, each at 74, Grade 10 Austin Yang at 75, and Grade 11 West Dingle at 78.
Su, Chen, and Yang all tied for sixth place overall individually in the BC tournament with two-round totals of 148. Zhang placed 15th at 152, and Dingle was 27th at 161.
The key, as it has been all spring for the Jags, was depth throughout the squad.
“Our goal as a team all season has been to shoot 300 [low four aggregate],” Bates said. “You get four guys coming in around 75 and you are always in the running.
“The guys were just so steady all year and that final day was no different . . . The vibe amongst the team was that we knew were going to play steady and we were cheering each other on.”
The “emotional leader” of the team, as usual, was its only senior – Zhang. A four-year member of the SMUS Golf squad, the Grade 12 Zhang was playing his final serious tournament golf for “at least the next few years” as he will fully concentrate on his studies this fall when he heads to the University of Waterloo.
“It felt amazing,” Zhang said of winning the blue BC banner.
What meant even more to him than the outcome, however, was the process – the experience of working together with his younger teammates toward this moment. “I’m very grateful for the experience of being on this team,” Zhang said. “We’ve been working really hard all year to prepare for this tournament. We really trusted each other and the coaches led us.”
Bates said Zhang was a key for the Blue Jags. “Sting was our guy who provided leadership through his passionate playing style and a lot of tournament experience,” he said. “You need a Grade 12 like that to lead the younger guys.”
That leadership certainly helped as the SMUS team came into the 2026 season with high expectations after reaching the provincial tournament last year at Big Sky in Pemberton, where the Blue Jags finished seventh with a young lineup that included then-Grade 9s Su and Yang, and then-Grade 11 Zhang.
They more than lived up to those expectations, playing a steady brand of team golf – with all four SMUS golfers also recording scores in the 70s – to win both the Island and Ladysmith tournament titles last month.
Other highlights of the season have included Top 10 finishes for each of two SMUS entries in the Victoria City Police Tournament at Olympic View Golf Club, highlighted by a fifth-place individual finish from Yang. SMUS also earned a seventh-place finish at the Vancouver Police Tournament played at Kings Links in Delta and Mayfair Lakes in Richmond, punctuated by Chen’s two-day total of 145 which included a 1-under 70 on the second day. In addition, the Blue Jags finished eighth in the Independent Schools Athletic Association tournament at the McCleery Golf Course in Vancouver.
But no finish was bigger than this past Wednesday’s, when the Blue Jags came up clutch as a team.
On The Redwoods challenging par-3 seventh hole in the final round of the BCs, all five SMUS players recorded pars, while the rest of the field typically played the hole to a bogey due to a tricky pin placement. Bates also recalls Zhang pumping his fist on No. 15 after a very difficult up-and-down for par that was emblematic of the entire team’s play under pressure.
“We went into the day with the message of ‘Let’s win our group’,” said Bates, whose golfers were paired with players from the other top three schools for the final round. “The strength of our team is the depth. All five guys are capable of shooting in the 70s.”
In fact, the SMUS team’s strength runs even deeper than the five-player squad for the BCs. Also members of the Blue Jags team are Grade 9 Noah Jun, and Grade 11s Ming Tsang and Jerry Tai. The eight total SMUS golfers pushed each other as they practised and played together all season and each of them competed in at least two tournaments. They were guided by Bates, who took over as Head Coach from Eric Donatelli last year, as well as Assistant Coaches Melanie Bendfeld and Graham Lilly.
The Blue Jags finished second at the BC tournament in 2019 with a young team under Donatelli and might well have captured a provincial title in 2020 if not for the pandemic. Bates was emotional when speaking to his team after the banner presentation on Wednesday, knowing what a significant and historic moment this was.
“It was a fitting end to a tremendous season for these guys and the school,” Bates said. “I think it will really sink in Monday when the school celebrates this team’s accomplishment with the raising of the blue banner to the rafters.”
