MOUNDSVILLE — The Wheeling Central Maroon Knights have carried their strong season into the postseason.

Central took the top spot in Monday’s WVSSAC Class AA, Region 1 Tournament, held on the links at Moundsville Country Club, against a field which included Oak Glen, Williamstown, Doddridge County, Ravenswood, Weir and Tyler Consolidated.

Wheeling Central wrapped up 18 holes with a team total of 237, followed by second place Doddridge County at 242. As the top two finishers, both teams advance to the State Tournament, held Oct. 14 and 15 at Oglebay’s Speidel-Jones Golf Course.

“I’m proud of the kids,” Wheeling Central head coach Jim Mortakis said. “Obviously this was one of our goals. We haven’t been very good in the regional. We’ve won more state championships than regional championships since I’ve been coaching.

“We wanted to win the regional. And the boys played well, all of them. And, you know, we’re trying to still improve. We have one more task at hand, the state tournament. And I certainly think that we’ll have a chance there also.”

The top two individual finishers from non-qualifying teams also punched at-large bids to the state tournament. Weir’s Evan Kaczmarek finished two strokes ahead of his closest competition, carding a 75. Kaczmarek birdied holes seven and 13 on the course.

“Everything was working out pretty well,” Kaczmarek said of his performance. “Practice round out here helped yesterday. Definitely still left a few out there.”

Kaczmarek said he was particularly happy with his wedge shots Monday. He is looking forward to state competition.

“It’s looking pretty good,” Kaczmarek said.”I’m pretty excited, pretty nervous too, just looking to take it one hole at a time.”

Wheeling Central’s Rowen Parker and Doddridge County’s Caleb Sutton each shot 77’s, but with both of their teams already having earned bids, the final at-large bid came down to Tyler’s John Mace and Williamstown’s Madilyn Buttrey, who each shot 78’s.

In a playoff on the 18th hole, Buttrey prevailed to punch her ticket.

Weir finished third as a team, Williamstown fourth, Tyler fifth, Oak Glen sixth and Ravenswood seventh.

Wheeling Central topped the field with an extremely young squad who have played like seasoned vets this season.

“We played with three freshmen and a sophomore today,” Mortakis said.

Despite their youth, the Maroon have been consistently at the top of leaderboards this season, including winning OVAC’s last month.

“Consistency has been the name of the team the entire year,” Mortakis said. “We’ve had six different kids, every one of them has been our low score at least once. So the consistency of our for our kids has helped us to create a learning pattern in which everybody supports each other and everybody plays for each other.”

Parker’s 77 was lowest on the team, followed by Conner Ball and Isaac Tiu, each at 80, and Zack Zende at an 83. Parker is the sophomore of the bunch, each of the others are freshmen.

“All the boys — Rowen played well, Conner played well, Isaac and Zack, so, you know, we would have pretty much won no matter whose scores we would have counted.

“Doddridge County was a very good opponent. They have really good golfers and they’ll probably be, I’d say, part of our main competition in the state tournament. Their boys are long hitters and that makes a difference on Jones.”