At the Bob Simons Classic at Elkview Country Club, the junior shot 1-under-par 71 during regulation, then eagled the first playoff hole to defeat Scranton Prep teammates Brendan Bell and Bobby Stott to capture the individual title. He also won the American Junior Golf Association 54-hole event at Normanside Country Club in Delmar, N.Y., near Albany with an 8-under 202.<\/p>\n
Powell is the first Athlete of the Week for the 2026-27 scholastic sports season and begins the program\u2019s 77th season.<\/p>\n
Family: Father, Will; mother, Pam; sister, Tiff<\/p>\n
Coach: Christi Dorece<\/p>\n
Talk about your regulation round at the Bob Simons Classic: I got off to a hot start with a birdie on hole 1 and a birdie on hole 3. Then everything kind of switched after my bad approach shot on No. 4. That slowed the momentum down for sure. I ended up making bogey and then I bogeyed hole 5. It was rough for a little bit because I couldn\u2019t get anything going after those holes. Then on 14 I got a two-putt birdie, which kind of pushed the momentum for (a birdie) on hole 17 as well.<\/p>\n
Describe your eagle in the playoff: I didn\u2019t hit a great drive, it ended up in the right rough a little bit under a tree. So I tried to hit a low cut under and around the tree. I didn\u2019t hit it too great, but it ended up how I wanted it to and working out great. Then I made the putt.<\/p>\n
What was it like playing in the playoff against two teammates as opposed to players from another team?: It was kind of calming. I play with those guys every day, so it didn\u2019t feel any different. It felt like a normal day going out there, having fun with your buddies.<\/p>\n
What does it mean to you to win the Simons Classic?: A lot. It came on my home course, so it definitely feels good to get it done repping my home course. So it felt great winning it for the first time, especially in that playoff. It felt more accomplishing.<\/p>\n
Talk about not only playing in the AJGA tournament, but winning it: I didn\u2019t get to go to a lot of them this summer because I was busy with everything else. They\u2019re the best of the best tournaments and it was kind of disappointing I didn\u2019t get to play in many. But I\u2019m glad the first one of the summer I got the win. I get to play in pretty much any AJGA event now since I\u2019m fully exempt for that tour. It feels great. Those are the best of the best of the best kids, so it\u2019s an amazing win.<\/p>\n
What was the key to your victory?: I putted very solid all week. Nothing great, but I didn\u2019t make any mistakes on the green. That was a huge, huge thing for me in the tournament. Sometimes I\u2019ll have one, two, three three-putts in a three-round span. But I came away with no three-putts, no missed short putts. Just a lot of confidence. I won by two. I was up one going into the last hole and ended up birdieing the last hole. Put it to about an inch for birdie.<\/p>\n
How does winning these two tournaments set you up for the season?: Winning the Bob Simons felt great. Putting that AJGA win on top of it makes it even better. It definitely sets the momentum and helps cruise along better.<\/p>\n
As defending PIAA Class 2A individual champion, do you feel any added expectations or pressure?: I\u2019m not going to say bigger expectations. I go into every tournament with the same mentality. Just play my own game and if it doesn\u2019t end up going my way, it doesn\u2019t go my way. As long as I go out there trying my best, putting my best efforts in. If it doesn\u2019t work out, it doesn\u2019t work out. That\u2019s just kind of my mentality.<\/p>\n
The team has won back-to-back PIAA Class 2A titles. Can you make it three straight this year?: We just have to stay confident. We\u2019re all good enough to do what we have to do. If we stay confident and stay together, we definitely can get the job done again.<\/p>\n
Favorite sports teams: Washington Commanders, Penn State football, Philadelphia Phillies, Philadelphia 76ers.<\/p>\n
What do you think of LeBron James joining the 76ers: It\u2019s great. Some people don\u2019t like it, but I think it\u2019s pretty good.<\/p>\n
Favorite food: Pasta<\/p>\n
Athletes I admire: Tiger Woods because of his mentality.<\/p>\n
Superstitions and rituals: I\u2019m very good with routines, so I kind of do the same thing the night before and when I wake up. I\u2019ll eat a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich before every tournament and match I have.<\/p>\n
One word to best describe me: Dedicated<\/p>\n
App I use the most: TikTok<\/p>\n
Funniest teammate: Probably Brian James. He\u2019ll just do something to lighten the mood and gets everyone laughing.<\/p>\n
You and any three golfers can play a round of golf. Who are you picking and where are you playing: Scottie Scheffler, Rickie Fowler, Tiger Woods. I\u2019ve got to play Augusta. That\u2019s pretty much a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.<\/p>\n
Have you started thinking about plans after graduation: I haven\u2019t gone on any visits, but I\u2019ve been in contact with multiple schools. That\u2019s been a fun process. I like engineering, but I heard some schools , if you play a sport they don\u2019t really allow you to do engineering. But I really like engineering and finance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At the Bob Simons Classic at Elkview Country Club, the junior shot 1-under-par 71 during regulation, then eagled…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271742,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[7804,772,305,178,180,179,726],"class_list":["post-271741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scranton","tag-athlete-of-the-week","tag-golf","tag-high-school-sports","tag-scranton","tag-scranton-headlines","tag-scranton-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271741\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}