2022 has been a breakout season for local junior golfer Walter Carley.
The Grade 12 Adam Scott Collegiate French Immersion student competed in his first national championship, performed well at two American events, helped Adam Scott win a COSSA gold medal and earned an individual bronze medal at OFSAA.
Carley, 17, started golfing when he was about six and his father Gord took him to Kawartha Golf and Country Club. Three years ago he started competing at junior tournaments in the Durham League and he had a number of top 10 finishes and a couple of runner-up results.
Hoping to take his game to a new level this year Carley attended two Hurricane Junior Tour events in South Carolina in February and March tying for fifth and second.
It kick-started a busy year where he placed 20th at the Golf Ontario Spring Classic, placed top 40 at the Ontario U119 championships in Sudbury qualifying him for the Canadian Junior Golf Championships Aug. 7-10 in Kamloops, BC where he placed 63rd of 156 golfers.
“It proved my game is headed in the right direction and that I can compete with some of the best junior golfers in Canada,” Carley said.
During the high school season, Carley was ranked second and his team first after two pre-Kawartha qualifying events. He placed first individually and Adam Scott won the team title at the Kawartha championships. He placed second at COSSA and the Lions won the team title.
He shot rounds of 75 and 70 to place third at OFSAA, at the FireRock Golf Club in Komoka, west of London. He and his teammates — Caden Imeson, Blake Lickfold and Owen Stevenson — placed eighth as a team.
“I’d never been to OFSAA golf before so I wasn’t sure what to expect,” he said. “I definitely exceeded expectations coming third and playing well. With golf you never really know how you’re going to play on any given day. You’re always trying to think the same way mentally to put yourself in the best position to succeed.”
Carley is building a resume that has garnered interest from US and Canadian universities, although he’s not close to making any decisions on where he’ll go next year.
“Throughout the summer my game’s just kept improving,” he said. “I’d definitely love next year to be able to play golf somewhere in the US at a university and continue the academics and playing golf for a team.”
At six-foot-six, 200 pounds he’s also a setter for the Lions senior volleyball team. He won COSSA volleyball titles in Grade 9 and 11 helping the Lions to a sixth-place finish at OFSAA last season. The team is strong again this year and hoping to do even better.
Carley said he had some interest from Canadian universities about playing volleyball.
“If it was an option I’d definitely look into it further but I think golf would be the path if I had to pick between the two just because I’m a little further down the road and have played it for longer and I’ m a little bit better at it,” Carley said. “I’m keeping all the doors open because I’m not 100 per cent sure what I want to do yet.”
Carley played rep baseball until Grade 9 and plays for the Lions varsity team. He also intends to play badminton for Adam Scott.
He gave up summer baseball because there were too many scheduling conflicts and “the two swings kind of get a little muddled up sometimes.”
He enjoys golf’s challenge.
“You can’t really complete golf,” Carley said. “There are always new things you can work on every round. There are always take-aways you can take from each round to work on and get better.”
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