Thomas packs the patience to claim a Philly Junior Tour victory at Inniscrone

 

   Jonathan Thomas of Landenberg was a par machine at Inniscrone Golf Club, an early Gil Hanse design in London Grove Township, Chester County, as his 4-over-par 74 was the best score of the day and enabled him to claim the top spot in the 13-to-15 division in a Philadelphia Section PGA Junior Tour stop June 23^rd.

   Thomas had 14 pars on his scorecard, including eight straight pars to open his round, and his patience over the tough Inniscrone layout was rewarded.

   Dean Matta, a West Grove resident playing close to home, Nathan Barker of Malvern and Jack Bishay of West Chester finished in a tie for second place, each ending up seven shots behind Thomas with an 81.

   Matta had eight pars on his card. Barker had 10 pars on his card, including five straight pars to close out his round. Bishay had nine pars on his card, including four straight pars to finish up his round.

  Kaycen Subbio of Blue Bell and Ryan Agan of Avondale shared fifth place, each signing for an 82 and Sam Nelligan, an incoming freshman at Boyertown, and Ethan Moran, a sophomore on the Spring-Ford golf team, finished in a tie for seventh place, each posting an 84.

   Carter Bove of Kennett Square took ninth place with an 86 and Jackson Ehrlich of Berwyn and Johnny Terzaghi of Wilmington, Del. rounded out the top 10 in the 13-to-15 division as they finished in a tie for 10^th place, each carding an 89.

   Brayden Hughes of Hockessin, Del. made birdies at the fifth and seventh holes and had eight pars on his scorecard, including five straight pars from 10 through 14, as he earned a Philly Junior Tour victory in the 16-to-18 division with a 9-over 79.

   Jaden Irvin, a senior on the Hershey High golf team, finished out his round with a birdie at the 18th hole and had seven pars on his card as he earned runnerup honors with an 80 that left him a shot behind Hughes.

   Vaughn Smartt of Bryn Mawr had 10 pars on his card as he finished in third place with an 82.

   Robert Rittereiser, coming off his freshman season with the Salesianum golf team, and Joseph Gangemi Jr. of Downingtown shared fourth place, each tallying an 84.

   Nicholas Milone of Bryn Mawr took sixth place with an 84 and Matt DeMarco, a senior on the Cardinal O’Hara golf team, and Ryan Eisenhart, a junior on the Spring-Ford golf team, finished in a tie for seventh place, each recording an 87.

   David Dempsey of Franklinville, N.J. took ninth place with a 91 and John Gross of Swedesboro, N.J. rounded out the top 10 in the 16-to-18 division as he finished 10^th with a 92.

   Emma Gangemi, a junior on the Downingtown East golf team and a member of Downingtown’s Team Gangemi, had five pars on her scorecard as she captured a Philly Junior Tour victory in the girls 16-to-18 division with an 87.

   Foridah Ismaila, a junior on the Great Valley golf team, made pars on the third and 14^th holes as she earned runnerup honors with a 113.

   Emily Renouf of Cinnaminson, N.J. rounded out the field in the 16-to-18 division as she finished in third place with a 115.

   Molly Wagner, a junior on the St. Mark’s golf team, had six pars on her scorecard as she matched Emma Gangemi’s 87 while claiming a Philly Junior Tour victory in the 13-to-15 division.

   Allison Choi of Penn Valley made a birdie on the ninth hole and finished out her round with a par at 18 as she earned runnerup honors with a 100.

   A couple of teammates on the Great Valley golf team, Kate Benson, a sophomore, and Olivia Rosen, a junior, finished in third and fourth place, respectively, as Benson posted a 113 and Rosen tallied a 120.

   Hridya Shah of Downingtown rounded out the field in the 13-to-15 division as she finished in fifth place with a 124.

   The competitive balance among the boys 12-and-under nine-holers was on display as Samuel Karas of Blue Bell, Kash Gray of Eagleville and Niko Muego of Bryn Mawr finished in a tie at the top of the leaderboard, each signing for a 4-over 39.

   Karas, coming off a victory the previous week in a Nine Hole Series stop at the Sweet Water Golf Course, had five pars on his scorecard, three of them consecutively at the second, third and fourth holes.

   Gray and Muego both had five pars on his card in joining Karas at 4-over.

   Landon Post of Lincoln University, the son of Patty Post, the overall director of the men’s and women’s programs at the University of Delaware, and Brendon Post, who is the head coach of the men’s team for the Blue Hens, took fourth place with a 42.

   Joey Charpentier of Schwenksville, coming off a victory a day earlier in a Philly Junior Tour stop at the Chapel Hill Golf Course, took fifth place with a 43, Ryan Scully of Chesterbrook was sixth with a 45 and Victor Wang of Hockessin, Del. and Ryan Stefanski of Newtown Square finished in a tie for seventh, each recording a 46.

   Nolan English of Villanova took ninth place with a 48 and Jackson Larrabee of Wilmington,
Del. rounded out the top 10 in the boys 12-and-under division as he finished 10^th with a 49.

   Addison Sabatini of West Chester bested the field of girls 12-and-under nine-holers as she carded a 50.

   Vivian Anderson of Wilmington, Del. made a par on the fifth hole as she rounded out a short field in the girls 12-and-under division as she finished in second place with a 55.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coatesville's Jakatt solid at Chapel Hill on his way to a Philly Junior Tour victory

 

   Braydon Jakatt, a senior on the Coatesville golf team, carded a solid 1-over-par 71 at the Chapel Hill Golf Course near Reading to claim a Philadelphia Section PGA Junior Tour victory in the 16-to-18 division June 22^nd.

   Jakatt made birdies at the fourth and seventh holes, went back-to-back with birdies at 10 and 11 and had 10 pars on his scorecard, including five straight pars to finish out his round.

   John Thompson, a junior on the Phoenixville golf team, and Radek Ramaley, a senior on the Nazareth golf team, shared second place, each ending up three shots behind Jakatt with a 4-over 74.

   John Thompson jump-started his round with an eagle at the par-5 fourth hole, added birdies at 10 and 15 and had eight pars on his card. Ramaley made birdies at the fourth and 14^th holes and had 11 pars on his card, including a string of five straight pars from five through nine.

   Grady Rupe, a senior on the Perkiomen Valley golf team, took fourth place with a 79 and Max Berish, a senior on the Owen J. Roberts golf team, Morgan Thompson, a senior and another member of Team Thompson on the Phoenixville golf team, and Victor Frederico of Moorestown, N.J. finished in a tie for fifth, each posting an 80.

   Landon Wolfe of Middletown, Del. took eighth place with an 82, Matthew Quinn of Abington was ninth with an 85 and Denny Deering, a junior on the golf team at The Haverford School, and Jaden Irvin, a senior on the Hershey golf team, rounded out the top 10 in the 16-to-18 division, each ending up in a tie for 10^th with 88s.

   Ruben Yoon, a sophomore on the Archmere Academy golf team, got off to a hot start and went on to capture a Philly Junior Tour victory in the 13-to-15 division with a 5-over 75.

   Yoon made a birdie at the second hole and then an eagle at the par-5 fourth before making another birdie at five. He ended up with eight pars on his scorecard.

   Jesse Kanefsky, a Bryn Mawr resident and a sophomore at The Haverford School, made birdies at the fourth, 11^th, 13^th and 16^th holes and had five pars on his card, four of them coming consecutively from five through eight, as he finished two shots behind Yoon in second place with a 7-over 77.

   Peter Heilman of Mechanicsburg and Harry Nepereny of Devon shared third place, each signing for an 80.

   Heilman made a birdie on the fourth hole and had nine pars on his card. Nepereny had 10 pars on his card.

   Charlie Murray of Berwyn took fifth place with an 85 and James Dugan of Villanova and Dylan Henzel of Wallingford finished in a tie for sixth, each recording an 87.

   Will Sylvester of Wayne and Michael McCalla of Newtown Square shared eighth place, each registering an 88, and Toby Parker of Chester Springs and Chase Fogli, another Wayne guy, rounded out the top 10 in the 13-to-15 division as they finished in a tie for 10^th, each posting a 90.

   Emily Stauffer, who wrapped up her scholastic career at Warwick last fall, was the lone entry in the girls 16-to-18 division and delivered the best score of the day among the girls with an 89.

   Stauffer made a birdie at the 13^th hole and had four pars on her scorecard.

   Alexa Mcelwain of Schnecksville made a birdie on the 10^th hole and had three pars on her scorecard as she earned a Philly Junior Tour victory in the 13-to-15 division with a 90.

   Naaya Patel of Moorestown, N.J. made pars on the first and 11^th holes as she earned runnerup honors with a 94.

   Lanie Whitehead of Swedesboro, N.J. rounded out the field in the 13-to-15 division as she made a birdie on the 10^th hole and a par at the first to finish in third place with a 106.

   Joey Charpentier of Schwenksville, who has been a fixture on the boys 12-and-under division leaderboards in 2026, made birdies at the fourth and ninth holes and had five pars on his scorecard, including three straight at six, seven and eight, as he bested the field of nine-holers with an even-par 36 on Chapel Hill’s outward nine.

   Blake Shurman of Villanova had six pars on his card as he earned runnerup honors with a 4-over 40.

Kash Gray of Eagleville made a birdie on the third hole and had six pars on his card, including a string of five pars in a row from five through eight, as he finished in third place with a 41.

   Niko Muego of Bryn Mawr took fourth place with a 42, Jaxon Price of York was fifth with a 43 and Grayson Wright of Philadelphia rounded out the field in the 12-and-under division as he finished sixth with a 44.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lane beats the heat and Kleinschmidt to capture GAP Junior Boys' crown at Chester Valley

 

   When we last left Riverton Country Club’s Jackson Lane and The Springhaven Club’s Luca Kleinschmidt, they had battled their way to two match victories June 24^th to reach the final of the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s 112^th Junior Boys’ Championship at Chester Valley Golf Club.

   Golf course availability always being a tricky proposition this time of the year, Lane and Kleinschmidt had to put that final on hold for a bit.

   They got back at it Thursday, teeing off at 7 a.m. to try to beat the heat in what would eventually become a 100-degree day.

   And it was the 16-year-old Lane, a junior at Cinnaminson High School, who put his name on the Peg Burnett Trophy with a hard-fought 2 and 1 victory.

   Lane has made steady progress in his junior career, but this was the kind of big win that could prove to be a springboard to bigger and better things.

   “A lot of the pressure is gone,” Lane told the GAP website. “I knew I could play up to this level. I’ve won before on different stages, but if feels like when I get so excited for these events and I hope I go out and thrive, sometimes I’ve got to tone it down and make it seem like a regular round.”

   Lane got the jump in the final, claiming a win at the 376-yard, par-4 first hole with a bogey in a bit of a nervous start for both players.

   Kleinschmidt, a scholastic standout at Strath Haven who will join the program at PSAC power Millersville later this summer, evened the match with a birdie at the 418-yard, par-4 sixth hole, where his approach finished seven feet from the hole and he drained the birdie try.

   But Lane again put a nose in front when his 9-iron approach from 145 yards away at the 405-yard, par-4 eighth hole left him with a 12-footer for birdie that he converted.

   Lane never surrendered the lead.

   It looked like Kleinschmidt might have an opportunity to even the match when he stuck a 9-iron at the 422-yard, par-4 12^th hole to 12 feet. But Kleinschmidt was left with a downhill putt and, even though he got a piece of the hole, the ball lipped out and proceeded to roll right off the green and 30 yards down the fairway.

   Who wouldn’t be shaken up a little by that turn of events? Kleinschmidt’s ensuing chip left him where Lane’s approach had settled, a little short of the green.

   Lane chipped up and two-putted for bogey that would be good enough to give him a 2-up lead. He grinded out halves on the next five holes to maintain that advantage and close out Kleinschmidt on the 17^th hole.

   Give the 18-year-old Kleinschmidt credit. He had earned a share of medalist honors in qualifying for match play over the challenging 6,631-yard, par-70 Chester Valley layout that once played host to a stop on what was known then  as the PGA Senior Tour (PGA Tour Champions nowadays) in its early days, and dominated three match-play opponents on his way to the final.

   But Lane, who had knocked off the defending champion, Merion Golf Club’s Sean Curran, a standout in the Inter-Ac League during his scholastic career at The Haverford School, in the semifinals.

   In the end, Lane got the validation he was seeking, even if he had to wait a couple of weeks to get it.