NSA golfer bags rare bird

Keith Cooper recently added a rare individual achievement as a golfer to his impressive accomplishments with Nansemond-Suffolk Academy’s team during his high school years.

Cooper was practicing with fellow NSA senior Will Comer on April 3 at the Elizabeth Manor Golf and Country Club in Portsmouth when he hit a double eagle on the par-5 third hole.

“I put a good swing on it, and it just hit my line,” Cooper said, later adding, “We thought it kind of went past the hole a little bit.”

He had never hit a double eagle, or a hole-in-one, for that matter, during his 10 years of playing golf.

“It’s incredible; it’s kind of more rare than a hole-in-one,” he said. “It’s a little bit harder with par-5s and double eagles because you’re hitting a longer shot into a green”

Cooper’s shot traveled 249 yards before finding the hole. He used a 3-wood to make it happen.

The shot helped him out significantly in the nine-hole round he was playing with Comer.

“I shot four-under that round,” Cooper said, which translates to a 31 at Elizabeth Manor.

During his high school career, Cooper has helped the Nansemond-Suffolk golf team claim two Virginia Independent Schools Athletic Association Division II state championships. The first came in 2012, when he was only a freshman, and the second came last year.

Cooper feels good about NSA’s 2015 season thus far.

“It’s going well,” he said. “We’re 10-0 and just kind of grooving.”

A lot of the wins have been by fairly wide margins, with the closest win coming against Cape Henry Collegiate School, he said.

Against the Dolphins, “We had to go to the fifth score again this year,” he said.

In a couple of weeks, “we’ll be playing (Norfolk Academy) and then Cape Henry again, so that’s when we kind of start getting into better competition,” he said.

Cooper committed last fall to attend and play golf for Virginia Wesleyan College after he graduates from NSA this summer.