Palmer Jackson, a Franklin Regional senior who plays out of Hannastown Golf Club in
Greensburg, has been the best junior golfer in Pennsylvania for a while now. So
it’s only appropriate that he represent the Keystone State when the best junior
golfers in America tee off in the U.S. Junior Amateur at one of America’s
classic complexes, Baltusrol Golf Club’s Upper and Lower courses in
Springfield, N.J.
Jackson earned a ticket to Baltusrol by claiming medalist
honors in a qualifier administered by the Golf Association of Philadelphia last
Monday at Carlisle Country Club. Punctuating his round by holing out from 20
yards away for eagle on the par-5 finishing hole at Carlisle, Jackson carded a
2-under-par 69, two better than anyone else in the field on a day when
temperatures creeped close to the 100-degree mark.
“Last year I played very poorly here, so my expectations
were low,” Jackson told the GAP website. “My game was good coming in. I played
pretty well all around on the front and hit the ball pretty well on the back.
“I got really sweaty halfway through the round and had trouble
controlling that. Slam-dunking it on No. 18 is crazy luck. I’m thrilled.”
Jackson had been the runnerup in the Pennsylvania Junior Boys' Championship in
2016 and finished third in 2015 before capturing the title a year ago. When I originally wrote this post, I assumed he was going to be defending that title this summer, but his name did not appear when the scorers started rolling in. He also plays baseball, so maybe he had a conflict with his other favorite sport. He
finished tied for second in the PIAA Class AAA Championship at the Heritage
Hills Resort last year as a junior and finished tied for ninth as a sophomore.
Only two other tickets to Baltusrol were handed out at
Carlisle and they went to two players who finished tied for second at even-par
71.
One went to Jolo Timothy Magcalayo of the Philippines.
Magcalayo and his sister Jano Angela Magcalayo had planned to spend the summer
playing junior golf in the United States and have been teeing it up in
Philadelphia Section PGA Junior Tour events. Jolo Timothy Magcalayo has been a
force in the 13-to-15 division whenever he has teed it up in Junior Tour
events.
Two days after the U.S. Junior Amateur qualifier, Magcalayo
had the second-best score in the overall 13-to-18 scoring in a Philadelphia
Junior PGA Championship qualifier at the Bayside Resort & Golf Club in
Selbyville, Del. Which means he’ll also get a shot to qualify for the Boys
Junior PGA Championship, which will tee off July 31 at Valhalla Golf Club in
Louisville, Ky.
Magcalayo was joined at even-par 71 by Matthew Manastero of
Leesburg, Va. The U.S. Junior Amateur tees off July 16. There will be two
rounds of qualifying for match play at the Upper and Lower courses. Match play
will contested on the Upper Course.
Remember, this was all before GAP’s 104th Junior
Boys’ Championship at Blue Bell Country Club that I chronicled all last week in
the blog.
Two guys who played pretty well at Blue Bell, Norristown’s
Joshua Ryan and Austin Barbin of Elkton, Md., got their week started with solid
1-over 72s at Carlisle. Ryan is the first alternate and Barbin is the second
alternate.
Ryan is home-schooled by Commonwealth Connections Academy
and represents Norristown High on the golf course. As a freshman last fall, he
qualified for the PIAA Championship joining older brother Caleb, who earned a
trip to Heritage Hills for the second straight fall.
Joshua Ryan just missed the championship flight in the GAP
Junior Boys and reached the first flight semifinals. Barbin, a senior at Red
Lion Christian Academy, reached the semifinals in the championship flight at
Blue Bell before falling, 1-up, in a hard-fought match with eventual champion
Ryan Tall.
Sometimes, proximity to the site of the championship seems
to matter when it comes time to call first alternates. Just trying to offer a
little hope to Ryan, caught in that disheartening limbo of first alternate.
No comments:
Post a Comment