While the 2015 King’s Fork High School golf team currently features a majority of inexperienced players, coach Calvin Mitchell already has reasons to be encouraged.

One of those reasons is the team’s improvement it has shown inside the first week of the new season.

“The first match, we weren’t able to post a score,” Mitchell said, noting the team did not have enough players with eligible scores. “But yesterday’s match, we posted our first score.”

The Bulldogs’ season-opening match came on Aug. 10 against Nansemond River High School at Sleepy Hole Golf Course. The Warriors produced a 338 score in their win.

On Aug. 13, King’s Fork posted a score of 456 as it faced Grassfield High School at Bide-A-Wee Golf Course in Portsmouth. The Grizzlies shot a 300.

The Bulldogs have lost five of their players from last year’s team that took third in the Ironclad Conference tournament. Included in that quintet were all three Bulldogs who qualified for the regional tournament last year — Will Crow, Noah Rose and Stephen Shaffer.

Crow and Shaffer graduated and Rose, now a junior, moved out of state.

Mitchell has two returning players from the 2014 squad and three beginners.

“The three beginners are much further along than I ever expected,” he said, adding they are making good contact with the ball. “The team as a whole is looking real good and getting better.”

And though the season has already started, Mitchell made it clear there is room for more team members.

“Right now we only have five players, and we’re still open to anyone else who is interested,” he said.

Currently occupying the No. 1 spot out of those five players is junior Tyler Branch.

He had the best score on the team both on Aug. 10, with a 107, and on Aug. 13, with a 105.

“He almost made it to regionals last year,” Mitchell said, and yet he has shown great improvement since then. “He hits the ball nothing like he hit last year. He hits much, much better. He’s more consistent this year.”

The coach noted Branch has made time to go out and practice since the 2014 season, which was his first playing golf.

Senior returner Briana DelaEspriella and senior Lindsay Carlesi are in competition for the No. 2 spot on the team.

Mitchell said DelaEspriella “has greatly improved her consistency and her distance” since her inaugural season playing the sport last year.

And he has some solid expectation of improvement from Carlesi, a golf rookie known for her contributions to the King’s Fork softball team.

“I expect her to step up, and she is,” Mitchell said. “Lindsay went from not posting a score in Monday’s round to posting 115 this round.”

If a player’s score exceeds double par on any given hole, it disqualifies them from posting a score for the round.

Mitchell pointed to an area in which the 2015 Bulldogs are ahead of their 2014 counterparts. A King’s Fork team rule states that if a Bulldog player cannot hit the ball on or near the fairway six out of 10 times with a given club, they cannot carry that club in their bag.

Unlike last year’s squad, every single 2015 player can carry a wood in their bag.

Mitchell is not lowering his expectations from previous years given an inexperienced team.

“My expectation is still to get to regionals as a team, and if not as a team, to continue the school’s history of having at least one player in regionals,” he said. “If they keep improving like they are, that should not be an issue.”

King’s Fork faces Lakeland High School on Aug. 17 at Sleepy Hole Golf Course.