SJ Welch did the right thing a year ago, and it ended his golf season in heartbreaking fashion.
Competing in a high-stakes conference qualifier to try to help earn his Nokomis Regional High School team a trip to the 2024 golf state championship, Welch put up a solid performance on the golf course at a critical time for his team.
But when he picked his ball up out of the hole, he realized he had made a mistake.
“I was watching him,” said Nokomis coach Matt Brown. “He putted the ball in and then he came right over to me and said, ‘Hey coach, this isn’t my ball.’ And I knew immediately that we were gonna have to report it.”
Reporting that accidental mistake was devastating for Welch and his teammates, who just barely missed out on the state tournament after Welch was disqualified for playing the wrong ball.
It was also the right thing to do.
“He could have easily not said a word and nobody would have known,” Brown said. “And so, a lot of coaches and a lot of players really respected SJ from that happening last year.”
Welch and his teammates responded with resolve, using that unfortunate ending last season as motivation for this year. And it helped power them to Nokomis’ first ever Class B state championship last Friday, along with an individual state championship for Welch.
The Nokomis senior shot a four-over-par 76 during tough conditions at Natanis Golf Course in Vassalboro.
“As far as last year, I mean it was a tough situation, me getting disqualified,” Welch told the Bangor Daily News on Tuesday. “But I think we used it as motivation for this year. I mean, we just worked super hard this year. And after what happened last year, we really wanted it more than we did the year before.”
Brown said that not many players would have done what Welch did a year ago, and called him an “outstanding kid” both on and off the golf course.
“He had a goal all year long. He had been waiting for this tournament for a year,” Brown said. “He was just determined and worked his butt off all year long to get back.”
Welch finished one stroke ahead of his friend Jack Quinn, the returning Class B state champion from Gardiner Area High School, to take home this year’s title. Welch thought that Quinn would surpass him in the final stretch, and was more concerned about his Nokomis team’s positioning than his own.
Then Quinn said by the scorers table that Welch bested him by one stroke.
“I was just speechless,” Welch said.
That wasn’t the only surreal moment for Welch and his Warriors teammates. They received a parade-like escort as they returned to Newport on Friday night.
“It’s just a feeling that you can’t really put into words,” said Welch, who added that it still hadn’t quite sunk in that this Nokomis team is the first in school history to win a golf state championship.
Brown recalled after the win how he told Welch ahead of time that his team would need to lean on him during Friday’s tournament. And the calm leader told his coach that he was ready.
“And for him to come back from that debacle last year to being the individual state champ this year, is just an incredible, incredible story,” Brown said.
After that experience a year ago, it’s hard not to see a stroke of cosmic justice in Welch’s individual win along with his team’s first-ever state title. With hard work and resolve, the pain of a self-reported disqualification has been replaced by the joy of a championship.
“If I didn’t tell anyone about that, it was going to be something that would be sitting in the back of my mind the rest of my life,” Welch said about last year’s situation. “I just couldn’t live, you know, playing the wrong ball and not telling anyone. I always try to do the right thing and I think that was the right thing to do for sure.”
And now he gets to spend the rest of his life as a Maine state champion.