With a round of four birdies and five bogeys, Palm Desert High School senior Cash Tompoles grabbed the lead Tuesday in the first round of the Desert Empire League boys golf individual finals.
Tompoles’ round of 73 at Classic Club in Palm Desert gave him a two-shot lead over teammate Reese Johnson and Xavier Prep sophomore Chris Starke through one day of the 36-hole event. The second round will be played Thursday, also at Classic Club.
Golfers in the event are chasing one of eight spots in the CIF-Southern Section individual preliminaries awarded to the DEL. Johnson, a junior at Palm Desert, had four bogeys and one birdie in his round of 75. Starke had a more roller-coast round with six bogeys, one double bogey and five birdies, including a birdie on the 18th hole to move him into a tie for second.
Xavier, which went undefeated in winning the DEL team title this season, had eight of the top 13 players on the leaderboard Tuesday. Tied for fourth at 78 were Sterling Conley of Xavier along with Preston Hoffman of La Quinta High School and Ryan Perrego of Rancho Mirage. Joe Mejia of Xavier was seventh at 90, followed by Marcelo Ibanez or Xavier.
Tied for eighth at 82 entering Thursday’s final round are Anay Patel of Palm Desert, and Tres Shalhoub, Sergio Rojo and Charlie Menke, all of Xavier.
The final round of the event will begin at 12:50 pm. Thursday at Classic Club.
This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Palm Desert’s Tompoles leads DEL boys finals, Xavier dominates leaderboard
Reporting by Larry Bohannan, Palm Springs Desert Sun / Palm Springs Desert Sun
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
