Hoquiam’s Ben Royer and Montesano’s Michael Jump tied for the lowest scores of the round with a 42, but Monte had the edge on Tuesday, beating the Grizzlies 180-196 at Highland Golf Course.

For Monte, Royer’s score was followed closely by Ben Wills — who ended his 9-hole round with a 44 — a score of 46 for Cody LaLonde with Dillon Schoch’s 48 rounding out the scoring.

Following Jump, Noah Sudderth shot a 46 for Hoquiam with Mick Bozich shooting a 52. Tommy Wallace was the Grizzlies’ fourth score with a 56.

Intermittent rain fell on the course throughout the day with a brief period of steady rain in the middle part of the round.

Monte head coach Doug Galloway didn’t think it had a significant impact on scores.

“I’m not sure how much the rain affected things today. I think it was more the ball getting hung up in the weather a little bit and the ball didn’t travel as far,” he said. “Any time you go play a different course, green speeds are different and that may have played a little part in some of the scores today.”

Hoquiam head coach Terry Helland wasn’t blaming the weather either, though he was hoping to see lower scores at this point of the season. Helland said his team has played in worse conditions and doesn’t see wet greens as an excuse for missed putts.

“From what we were seeing, I think we can putt better, especially going forward. This close to districts, giving away strokes on the green is going to be where kids can make or break themselves when it comes to qualifying for state,” he said. “We saw guys not making putts that they have been earlier in this season, or missing putts that they should be making at this point in the season.”

Hoquiam has two matches left on its regular-season schedule while Monte has three matches remaining, but both are operating with the district tournament in mind on Oct. 24.

With all four of his top golfers finishing with scores in the 40’s, Galloway is just hoping to continue this level of play when it matters most.

“I think we’ve been pretty solid all year long. We just want to keep playing well and get ready for districts, which is next week,” he said. “I’m just excited the kids got to play and didn’t get all wet today.”

Hoquiam, on the other hand, is still waiting for leaders to emerge in the third and fourth spots.

“Right now we’ve got a few people that are moving to where they want to be. Then we have a huge group that I think are still trying to figure out if they’re going to be a part of that top group,” Helland said. “We’ve got about six guys that are all kind of battling it out for one spot. We’ll see how some of those kids rise to the occasion.”

Helland highlighted junior varsity golfer Nyeki Dayton for posting one of his lowest scores of the year with a 47 and hopes to see the trend continue.

Montesano will be on the links again on Wednesday with a road match against Kalama on Wednesday.

Hoquiam will play a three-way home match with Seton Catholic and La Center at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday.

Monte’s coaches aren’t looking to make any major tweaks heading into its final matches, but Helland wants to use the remaining matchups on the schedule to see who can step up at the end of the year.

“This time of year it’s not about what you’ve been doing the entire season,” he said. “We’re also looking at who has been answering the call here in the last few weeks. We want to see who’s coming in hot,” he said.

Montesano — Royer (42), Wills (44), LaLonde (46), Schoch (48) — 180

Hoquiam — Jump (42), Sudderth (46), Bozich (52), Wallace (56) — 196