BY MARK MORING, Eastern Shore Post, Sept. 19, 2025
In the summer of 2024, Micah Bennicoff, then a rising sophomore at Chincoteague High School, decided to play football. He had played golf for the Ponies the previous year and thought he’d give the gridiron a go this time around.
Then golf coach Steve Katsetos called and recruited him for the golf team. Bennicoff thought he was facing a tough decision, but Katsetos immediately put him at ease.
“You don’t have to choose,” the coach said. “Play both.”
“I didn’t know that was an option,” Bennicoff responded.
So he jumped at the chance, and now, as a junior, he’s in his second season balancing the two sports.
He admits it’s challenging to try to play golf during the week with football practice every day but says his coaches “work great together to support me.”
In August, before school started, Bennicoff was able to play in the team’s matches early in the day and then rush off to football practice. He sometimes arrived late but says football coach Geno Geminiani “is very understanding.”
Now that school is back in session, Bennicoff rarely gets to practice both sports on the same day. But he hits the golf course hard on weekends to make up for it.
This week, Bennicoff and the Ponies competed in the Eastern Shore District Tournament, which was held Thursday at the Eastern Shore Yacht & Country Club. (Results were too late for this edition; they will be included next week.)
Nandua has been the team to beat on the Shore, but the Ponies have played the Warriors close and even topped Nandua in an August meet.
Bennicoff and sophomore Bryce Luck are fairly even as Chincoteague’s top players; both average around 45 or 46 strokes over nine holes. (Northampton has a team for the first time in years, but it’s a very young squad and has a ways to go to catch up to the others. Arcadia does not have a team.)
“Our goal as a golf team is to play our very best every time,” Bennicoff says. “It’s you against the course, not so much against the guy you’re playing.
“Of course our goal is to win, but Nandua’s coaches and players are all great guys. They are always a pleasure to golf with.”
Bennicoff is always a pleasure, period, says Katsetos.
“I’ve coached many athletes, and Micah is one of the most coachable I’ve had,” says Katsetos. “He has a very good demeanor and a positive attitude.”
And a killer drive. Bennicoff averages about 275 yards off the tee and occasionally surpasses 300 yards. Part of that is good form, of course, but he’s also ripped at 6-foot-1, 205 pounds. He worked all summer on bulking up for football, which he says has also improved his driving distance.
On the gridiron, where the Ponies play 8-man football, Bennicoff is everywhere, playing tight end, fullback, linebacker, and defensive end. Chincoteague (2-2) had this week off, and Bennicoff says he’s “confident this team can be something very special” in the second half of the season.
During the winter, Bennicoff, who has a 3.9 GPA, competes in Scholastic Bowl, and in the spring, he plays baseball, his best sport. He was an honorable mention all-district pick on the diamond last spring and hopes to play in college.
Away from sports, Bennicoff is active at Chincoteague’s Island Baptist Church, where his dad, Phil Bennicoff, is pastor. “My faith motivates me,” says Micah. “I want to do the right thing whether someone is watching or not.”
His mother, Rachel Bennicoff, is a health care technical analyst. His sister, Alissa, is a freshman at CHS, where she plays three sports, and his brother is a fourth-grader getting into baseball and basketball.
Time will tell whether any of his younger siblings will try to play two sports in the same season, but for now, Micah is glad he didn’t have to make that choice.
“I love both football and golf, and if I had to choose, I don’t think I could pick one over the other,” he says. “I’m just happy and blessed I get to play both at the same time.”
