It had been a disappointing day Monday for Colby Komancheck, the Malvern Prep junior who has been one of the Inter-Ac League’s top players the last two falls, as he tried to make it to the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship in a qualifier at Chambersburg Country Club.
Komancheck never got it going as thunderstorms caused delays, although his 84 was never going to get it done.
Komancheck, however, knew he had a perfect chance to redeem himself with the Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship, a qualifier for the Boys Junior PGA Championship, being played Tuesday at the RiverCrest Golf Club & Preserve.
RiverCrest is the golf course Komancheck has played growing up. The pro shop at RiverCrest is run by his father Jamie, the head pro, and his mother Kelly, also a PGA professional.
And redeem himself Komancheck did. He came roaring out of the gate with a spectacular 5-under-par 31 tour of the outgoing nine at RiverCrest on his way to a 3-under 68 that left him in a tie for medalist honors with Daniel Boone senior Chase Yenser.
A playoff was held to determine the medalist and Komancheck prevailed on the first hole of the playoff.
The event, which brings together the very best junior golfers from all over the region, was, as usual, scheduled to be a one-day 36-hole shootout. But the weather forecast held out little hope for 36 holes of golf Tuesday and the Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship was limited to one round.
The winner of the Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship is an automatic qualifier for the Boys Junior PGA Championship, which tees off July 29 at the Birck Boilermaker Golf Complex on the campus of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind.
Pretty sure each PGA Section gets a least one wild card and maybe two, so Yenser, coming off his impressive victory in last week’s Pennsylvania Golf Association Junior Boys’ Championship at Hershey Country Club’s East Course, should definitely be headed to West Lafayette.
There was a playoff for fourth place and Komancheck’s Malvern Prep teammate, Davis Conaway, won the playoff, so maybe that means the Philadelphia Section will send four to the Boys Junior PGA Championship.
Conaway was the runnerup to Malvern Prep teammate Michael Henry in the Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship a year ago and represented the Philadelphia Section in the Boys Junior PGA Championship, which was held at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Md. It would be nice to see Conaway make a return trip to the PGA of America’s top national event for junior golfers.
Certainly hoping the third-place finisher in the overall scoring, Unionville senior Charlie Barrickman, gets a nod to the Boys Junior PGA Championship.
Barrickman came up painfully short of a spot in the U.S. Junior Amateur as he finished a shot out of a playoff for the fourth and final berth out of the Golf Association of Philadelphia-administered qualifier at Chambersburg with a 1-under 72. He is the second alternate.
The Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship was for players 13 to 18. The Philadelphia Section PGA Junior Tour broke out its usual 16-to-18 and 13-to-15 divisions, so I’ll wrap up the top 10 in each division while referring to the overall scoring.
Komancheck came out of the younger 13-to-15 division and finished at the top of the leaderboard in that group.
Komancheck, a top-five finisher in the Bert Linton Invitational for the Inter-Ac’s individual championship in each of the last two falls, was on fire early on his home course Tuesday.
Komancheck made a birdie on the first hole, eagled the par-5 second hole and added birdies at four and eight. He cooled off a little after that with bogeys at the 12th and 13th holes, but he got it to the house at 3-under.
Ian Rotto, a sophomore on the Kennett golf team, made birdies on the second, third, fourth, sixth and 15th holes and had nine pars on his scorecard as he was the runnerup to Komancheck in the 13-to-15 division with a 1-under 70.
Rotto matched the 1-under totals recorded by Conaway and West Chester Rustin senior Cole Berry from the 16-to-18 division, but it looks like Rotto was placed sixth in the overall scoring as a result of the playoff that Conaway won. Really strong showing by Rotto in a deep and talented field.
A couple of certified phenoms, Trebor Melendez, the 12-year-old from Vineland, N.J., and Logan McGinn, the 13-year-old from South Williamsport, shared third place in the 13-to-15 division with Sam Vinc of Brockton as all three landed on 2-over 73.
That trio ended up in a six-way logjam tied for 10th place in the overall scoring with Andrew Ekstrom, who wrapped up a standout scholastic career at York Suburban last fall, Strath Haven senior Luca Kleinschmidt and Cade Kelleher, who wrapped up a standout scholastic career at Abington Heights last fall, out of the 16-to-18 division.
It was a typically steady round for Melendez as he made birdies at the first and ninth holes and had 12 pars on his card.
McGinn made birdies on the first, 11th, 16th and 17th holes and had nine pars on his card. Vinc made a birdie on the third hole and had 12 pars on his card, seven of them on the incoming nine at RiverCrest.
Cole Powell, a freshman on Scranton Prep’s PIAA Class AA Championship team last fall, finished in sixth place in the 13-to-15 division with a 4-over 75 and Quinn Gallagher, a sophomore on The Haverford School’s Inter-Ac championship team last fall, was another shot behind Powell in seventh with a 76.
Nazareth sophomore Alex DiGiacinto took eighth place among the younger guys with a 78 and Rithvik Nimma of Newtown was ninth with an 81.
Rounding out the top 10 in the 13-to-15 division were Taimoor Naseem of Sinking Spring and Henry Sokol of Villanova as they finished in a tie for 10th place, each signing for an 81.
It was a surgical performance at RiverCrest for Yenser, who was, like Barrickman, in the thick of things in the U.S. Junior Amateur qualifier Monday at Chambersburg. Yenser matched par with a 73, two shots out of the playoff for the final berth to the USGA’s major event for junior golfers.
Yenser, who finished in a tie for second place in the PIAA Class AAA Championship last fall, made birdies at the fourth, ninth and 11th holes and parred the rest in a no-bogey 3-under 68 that matched Komancheck for the top spot in the overall scoring. Yenser finished first in the 16-to-18 division.
Barrickman, who has been one of District One’s top players the last two fall seasons, made four birdies on the final five holes in a 3-under 33 tour of RiverCrest’s back nine on his way to a 2-under 69 that left him alone in third place in the overall scoring and in second place behind Yenser in the 16-to-18 division.
Not sure where Barrickman started, but he made a birdie on the 14th hole and then ripped off three straight birdies at 16, 17 and 18. He also made a birdie on the fourth hole and had 10 pars on his card.
It was a tough day at Chambersburg Monday for Conaway, the winner of the Bert Linton as a freshman in the fall of 2022. He was even-par before making a couple of big numbers and didn’t return to the course after a weather delay.
Conaway started off the 10th tee at RiverCrest and quickly found himself playing from behind with a triple bogey at the 12th hole.
He got a shot back with a birdie at the 16th hole and made another birdie at two before falling back to 2-over with a bogey at three. But Conaway righted the ship with birdies at the fourth, fifth and seventh holes to join Berry and Rotto at 1-under and then won the playoff for fourth place in the overall scoring.
Hopefully, fourth place will send Conaway to West Lafayette.
Berry helped the Knights capture the District One Class AAA team crown and finish in a tie for fifth in the PIAA Class AAA team chase last fall.
Berry made birdies at the second, sixth, 12th and 14th holes and had 11 pars on his card as he shared third place with Conaway in the 16-to-18 division and was fifth in the overall scoring as a result of the playoff.
Haverford School senior Sean Curran, the reigning Bert Linton Inter-Ac individual champion, and Barrickman’s Unionville teammate, Nicolas Gaughan, also a senior for the Longhorns, each matched par with a 71 to finish in a tie for fifth place in the 16-to-18 division and in a tie for seventh in the overall scoring.
Curran, who plays out of Merion Golf Club, captured the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Junior Boys’ Championship at Merion’s West Course a couple of weeks ago.
Curran headed for Corning Country Club in Corning, N.Y. on the heels of his GAP Junior Boys victory to try to qualify for the U.S. Junior Amateur, but was unable to advance to the championship.
Perkiomen Valley senior Alex Hall, the grandson of World Golf Hall of Famer Gary Player, finished alone in seventh place in the 16-to-18 division and in ninth in the overall scoring with a 1-over 72 at RiverCrest. Hall was a PIAA Class AAA qualifier last fall.
Ekstrom, Kleinschmidt and Kelleher rounded out the top 10 in the 16-to-18 division as they finished in a tie for eighth place, each landing on 2-over 73.
Ekstrom and Kelleher were both PIAA Class AAA qualifiers as seniors last fall. Kleinschmidt has been playing some really solid golf of late, including a tie for sixth place in last week’s Pennsylvania Junior Boys’ Championship at Hershey East.
Ekstrom, Kleinschmidt and Kelleher rounded out the top 10 in the overall scoring as they finished in a tie for 10th place with Melendez, McGinn and Vinc from the 13-to-15 division.
Recent West Chester Rustin graduate Sam Feeney was the local player who came closest to earning a trip to the U.S. Junior Amateur in Monday’s qualifier at Chambersburg.
Feeney, who capped an outstanding scholastic career with the Knights by leading them to the District One Class AAA team crown as a senior last fall, tallied a 2-under 71 over the 6,962-yard, par-73 Chambersburg layout and lost in a playoff to 16-year-old Max Bradshaw of Virginia Beach, Va. and a sophomore at Norfolk Academy for the final guaranteed ticket to the U.S. Junior Amateur.
Feeney, who was playing out of Penn Oaks Golf Club, is the first alternate.
A couple of foreign invaders, Ryan Xie of New Zealand and Arrow Aarav Shah of India, shared medalist honors as each posted a 4-under 69.
Benjamin Baker of Broadlands, Va., who will join the program at Virginia Tech in the Atlantic Coast Conference later this summer, finished in third place with a 3-under 70 to punch his ticket to the U.S. Junior Amateur.
The U.S. Junior Amateur will tee off July 21 at the Trinity Forest Golf Club in Dallas, Texas.
The guys played their qualifier at Chambersburg in the afternoon and endured rain and at least one weather delay.
In the morning, the girls played their qualifier for the U.S. Girls’ Junior Amateur Championship, also administered by GAP, and recent Plymouth-Whitemarsh graduate Rhianna Gooneratne beat Phoenixville product Kate Roberts in a playoff to earn the second and final berth up for grabs to the USGA’s biggest event for junior girls golfers.
Gooneratne, the PIAA Class AAA champion as a junior in the fall of 2023 and the runnerup as a senior last fall, matched par with a 73 over the 6,258-yard, par-73 Chambersburg layout, a total equaled by Kate Roberts. Gooneratne will join the program at Delaware later this summer.
Kate Roberts, who finished in a tie for second place behind Gooneratne in the PIAA Class AAA Championship as a senior in 2023, spent the wraparound 2024-2025 college season on the roster of Mountain West Conference power San Jose State.
Kate Roberts is the first alternate out of the Chambersburg qualifier. As I mentioned in a post on the Pennsylvania Junior Girls’ Championship at Lebanon Country Club last week, Kate Roberts’ younger sister Kayley, who will be a senior at Phoenixville this fall, punched her ticket to the U.S. Girls’ Junior with a runnerup finish in a qualifier at the U.S. Naval Academy Golf Club in Annapolis, Md. June 10th.
Decent shot Kate Roberts, who finished in a tie for fifth place in the Pennsylvania Junior Girls at Lebanon last week, tags along with her sister Kayley to Atlanta in hopes a spot opens up for an alternate before the U.S. Girls’ Junior tees off July 14.
Still have some catching up to do on the Philly Junior Tour and I still plan to do roundups on those events, but wanted to get to the Philadelphia Boys Junior PGA Championship in a timely fashion. For a blogger who tries to pay attention to the junior golf scene in this area, it is definitely one of the biggest events on the summer calendar. The Philadelphia Girls Junior PGA Championship will be contested Monday at DuPont Country Club's Nemours Course.
No comments:
Post a Comment