{"id":353908,"date":"2021-10-18T06:06:55","date_gmt":"2021-10-17T20:06:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=353908"},"modified":"2021-10-18T06:06:55","modified_gmt":"2021-10-17T20:06:55","slug":"mini-games-golf-team-named","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/mini-games-golf-team-named\/","title":{"rendered":"Mini Games golf team named"},"content":{"rendered":"
CNMI National Golf Team for the Northern Marianas Pacific Mini Games 2022 pose after their selection following the final qualifier last Saturday at the Coral Ocean Resort. Flanking them are Northern Marianas Pacific Mini Games 2022 Organizing Committee CEO Vicente \u201cBen\u201d Babauta, left, and organizing committee chair Marco Peter. (Mark Rabago)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The CNMI saw its first national team for next year\u2019s Pacific Mini Games named when 14 golfers were selected following the final qualifier last Saturday at the Coral Ocean Resort in Agingan.<\/p>\n

Making up the CNMI National Golf Team for the Northern Marianas Pacific Mini Games 2022 are J.J. Atalig, Peter \u201cDung\u201d Tenorio, Harry Nakamura, Joe \u201cKamikaze\u201d Camacho, and Franco Santos for the men, Nirimai Koebel, Rose Rohringer, and Janet Torres for the women, Li Zhi Yun, Joshua Atalig, Antonio Norita, and Joey Dela Cruz Jr. for the junior men, and Zhimin Jin and Sorian Oh for the junior women.<\/p>\n

Atalig topped the five-round qualifier for the men\u2019s that started last July 21 with a 227 followed by Tenorio (230), Nakamura (232), Camacho (237), and Franco (244). Marco Peter actually beat Franco in a tiebreak after both wound up with identical scores, but Peter yielded to Franco so he can concentrate on his duties as chairman of the Pacific Mini Games organizing committee.<\/p>\n

Koebel finished No. 1 among the women with her 277 with Rohringer and Torres coming in tied in second place with their 293. Li was first in the junior men with his 247. Atalig and Norita came in second and third with their 263 and 306, respectively. Dela Cruz was fourth with his 312. Zhimin topped the junior women after shooting a 263 with Oh second at 351.<\/p>\n

Commonwealth Federation of Golf Associations president Edward Manibusan congratulated all those who made it to the national team and also thanked everyone who took part in the last five qualifiers. He also thanked the Coral Ocean Resort for agreeing to host the golf event for next year\u2019s Mini Games and also the Mini Games organizing committee led by CEO Vicente \u201cBen\u201d Babauta.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team that will represent the CNMI will be a great team and we\u2019re so proud of you guys for doing such a great job. In the next few months this team is going to get together and practice and represent the CNMI and I\u2019m sure they will try their best to win the gold,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For J.J. Atalig, it will be his second time representing the CNMI in the golf competition of the Mini Games, having donned the Commonwealth\u2019s colors in the 2019 Pacific Games in Apia, Samoa.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel good. I worked hard to be part of the team. We look forward to just trying to get medals because that\u2019s the goal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The final qualifier also saw all golfers vying for a place in the national team walk the course instead of using a golf cart.<\/p>\n

\u201cWalking was good despite the rain this morning when we first started. The weather actually cooperated after that. So it worked out pretty good,\u201d said Atalig.<\/p>\n

Tenorio, who in the past represented the CNMI in regional competitions in baseball, said it\u2019s a \u201cbig honor\u201d to again make the national team for golf this time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not easy to make the team. Conditions were really tough today. When we started the rain was really coming hard and the wind was blowing. We just tried to control what best we could and play out until the sun came out. Conditions got better and we tried to maximize because COP is a very long golf course,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Tenorio said walking the course compared to riding a golf cart was a huge difference. <\/p>\n

\u201cWalking you get fatigued easily when you\u2019re not used to it. Riding in a cart you get very lazy and you don\u2019t walk that much. It made a big impact in the game today because not only did you have to walk but you have to keep focus and play against the elements and a very tough group of guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

Koebel said she\u2019s very proud to represent the CNMI in next year\u2019s Mini Games.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s tough today because of the rain and it\u2019s a very long course. Specially today the front nine was very tough for me and in the back nine it heated up. It was hot!\u201d<\/p>\n

Li, a 13-year-old student from Dandan Middle School, said playing in the final qualifier was tough. \u201cIt was really hard. I played OK. It was fun, but it was very hard. It was very tiring [walking] but after a while it was OK. I shot OK. I\u2019m very excited to be part of the CNMI team to the Mini Games next year. There will be a lot of people coming from other places,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Zhimin seconded Li when she said she\u2019s very proud to be representing her home islands in the quadrennial event next year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel very honored and happy at the same time,\u201d said the 14-year-old Marianas High School student.<\/p>\n

When asked about the ban on golf carts on the fifth qualifier, Zhimin said it really didn\u2019t matter. \u201c I don\u2019t really saw the difference [between walking and riding a cart].\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The CNMI saw its first national team for next year\u2019s Pacific Mini Games named when…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":353910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[17845],"class_list":["post-353908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-mini-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=353908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}