If you’re driving by Aronimink Golf Club or Llanerch Country
Club or Overbrook Golf Club Saturday and it looks like the golfers are grinding
a little harder than usual, it’s probably because they are.
The champion of the BMW Golf Association of Philadelphia
Team Matches top division, Division AA, will be determined Saturday and three
of the final four are the three aforementioned Delco clubs.
“The result of the first three weeks leads to probably one
of the most exciting days of competition that we have on the GAP schedule,”
Oscar Mestre, captain of defending champion Overbrook, told the GAP website.
“It’s a fun kind of pressure, playing three other very solid teams. It’s a
special day. I know that all four clubs will take it seriously and make the
most of it.”
Anybody who checks into this blog from time to time would
not be surprised to learn that three clubs in this county would emerge from a
GAP competition that encompasses the entire region, including South Jersey, as
three of the final four teams in the Team Matches, which were first contested
in 1897 – and that’s not a typo.
It is Llanerch’s first appearance in the final four since
2007.
“The last couple of years, we’ve been 2-0 and got defeated
in that third week,” Llanerch captain Tom Spano told the GAP website. “The
beauty of our place is 11 of our 12 guys are under 40-years old. I think we have a really deep middle-amateur
squad. There’s a lot of energy and a lot of dedication. We take it pretty seriously.”
In its final match against Little Mill, Llanerch got strong
showings at Little Mill from Stephen Seiden, a Strath Haven All-Delco and
two-time U.S. Amateur qualifier, and James Wingerter, who piled up eight points
between them, and back at Llanerch from
Eddie Johnson and Kevin McDermott, a Haverford High All-Delco who nearly won
the 1994 PIAA title, who earned 6.5 points.
Aronmink got a huge effort from the brothers Siegfried,
Cory, a Haverford School product and the 2010 Pennsylvania Amateur champion,
and Max, who was one of the Inter-Ac League’s top players as a junior at
Haverford School last fall. Cory and Max came home from Glenmaura National Golf
Club with nine points to add to the cause.
Aronimink also got a boost by adding Michael Davis, the
former Malvern Prep standout coming off an outstanding freshman season at
Princeton, to the lineup.
All Overbrook had to do to assure that it would get a shot
to defend its title is beat Merion without two of its best players in Chris
Lange and Haverford School All-Delco and former Villanova standout Michael
Kania.
Lange’s son Chris went over to Merion and came home with
nine points while the old guys, Andy and Ray Thompson, mined the store at home
with three singles points apiece. Brad McFadden matched the Thompson brothers
with three singles points as well at Overbrook.
The Cricket Club had four of its best players, Philip
Bartholomew, Andy Latkowski, Sean
Semenetz and Jack Wallace, out of the lineup while they competed in the
inaugural USGA Amateur Four-Ball Championship at The Olympic Club in San
Francisco.
I don’t know this for a fact, but I wouldn’t be surprised if
the Cricket Club got a boost from the addition of Cole Berman, the two-time Daily Times Player of the Year at
Haverford School who is coming off a really strong freshman season at
Georgetown, to the lineup. The return of
that foursome from the USGA Four-Ball will make the Cricket Club a formidable
team indeed.
Each club will dispatch three man teams to each course
Saturday with each player competing in a three-way match against a foe from one
of the other teams. Like I said, they’re going to be grinding out there.
Purdue surges into second
Anybody who has followed along as I have followed the
fortunes of Chichester’s 2010 PIAA champion Aurora Kan and her Purdue teammates
this spring will know that I am the least surprised person in America to find
out that the Boilermakers fired a sparkling 5-under 283 total in Round 2 of the
NCAA’s Notre Dame Regional Friday to climb into second place in the team
standings, five shots back of reigning NCAA champion Duke.
More importantly, Friday’s fireworks puts Purdue in very
solid position to finish in the top six following Saturday’s final round and
move on to the NCAA Tournament in a
couple of weeks.
After a so-so opening-round of 299 Thursday left the
Boilermakers in a tie for ninth, August
Kim, a sophomore from St. Petersburg, Fla., went off on the front nine at the
Warren Golf Course on the campus of Notre Dame. Kim made eagle on the par-5
second hole and then added birdies at the third, sixth and seventh holes.
Kim would finish with a 3-under 69 that gave her a 1-under
143 total and vaulted her into a tie for fifth in the individual standings,
just four shots back of Duke’s Celine Boutier, a junior from France who was the
consensus Player of the Year in women’s college golf a year ago. After a
blistering 5-under 67 to open the tournament Thursday, Boutier fell back with
an even-par 72 Friday for a 5-under 139 total. Her teammate, Leona Maguire, a freshman
from Ireland, is a shot back in second at 4-under 140 following a sparkling
4-under 68 Friday.
Kan, a senior, and Anna Appert Lund, a junior from Sweden,
backed up Kim’s round with a couple of 2-under 70s. Kan, a three-time Daily Times Player of the Year at
Chichester, and Appert Lund had each opened with 76s, so they both landed at 2-over 146 and tied
for 15th in the individual standings.
Marta Martin, a freshman from Spain, was Purdue’s leading
lady on Day 1 with a 1-over 73 and she fell back a shot with a 74 and stands in
a tie for 20th at 3-over 147. Kan’s fellow senior, Johanna
Tillstrom, like Appert Lund a Swede, is tied for 91st after rounds
of 82 and 78 and a 160 total. Don’t be surprised if Tillstrom gets it going
Saturday.
The second-round 283 gives Purdue a 6-over 582 total, five
shots back of Duke (288-289). The Boilermakers will have to grind it out in
Saturday’s final round as there are plenty of talented teams right on their
tail. Wake Forest is in third, three shots back of the Boilermakers at 585.
Arizona is another shot back in fourth at 586, followed by UC Davis in fifth at
589 and Tulane in sixth at 593.
But Devin Brouse’s team showed what it is capable of doing
Friday. One more day in that neighborhood and Purdue, which somehow never
cracked the top 30 in anybody’s rankings this spring, will be headed for Bradenton,
Fla. and The Concession Golf Club for the NCAA Tournament.
Walker, Herr tee off in Four-Ball
Speaking of the inaugural U.S. Amateur Four-Ball
Championship that those Philadelphia Cricket Club guys played in last weekend,
Saturday morning the District One all-star duo of 2014 PIAA champion Brynn Walker, a junior at Radnor, and her
pal, Council Rock North junior Madelein Herr, will tee off in the inaugural
women’s Four-Ball at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Bandon, Ore.
It is the fourth USGA event for Walker, won competed for
Pennsylvania in the USGA Women’s Team Championship prior to her sophomore
season at Radnor and qualified for both the U.S. Girls’ Junior and U.S. Women’s
Amateur championships last summer.
It’s a busy weekend for the Herr family as Maddie’s older
sister Erica, a two-time PIAA champion, is on the Wake Forest team that trails
Aurora Kan’s Boilermakers in the NCAA South Bend Regional by three shots. Erica
Herr, a freshman, had rounds of 78 and 76 and is tied for 58th in
the individual standings at Notre Dame at 154.
I will be checking the USGA site over the weekend as the
Walker-Herr duo competes in two rounds of stroke play Saturday and Sunday in an
attempt to qualify for match play. There are tons of good players teeing it up
in this event from all over the country, but these two will be having some fun
out there and hopefully making some birdies.
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