Tall caps two weeks of match-play mastery by taking GAP's Junior Boys' Championship

   Spring-Ford Country Club’s Ryan Tall, one of the top Central League golfers the last two seasons at Conestoga, completed a remarkable run of match-play success Thursday by capturing the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Junior Boys’ Championship with a 4 and 3 victory over Shawnee Country Club’s William Mirams at Blue Bell Country Club.

   The recent Conestoga graduate, who is headed for Lafayette later this summer, reached the semifinals of the BMW Philadelphia Amateur Championship at Whitemarsh Valley Country Club last week. Tall’s victory over Mirams, who finished tied for second in the PIAA Class AA Championship as a junior at Notre Dame of East Stroudsburg, was his fourth in the Junior Boys, giving him a 7-1 match-play mark in two highly competitive events.

   “It’s crazy that I am even out here holding the microphone,” Tall said while being interviewed by GAP following his win over Mirams. “I recognize so many of the recent names on that trophy. This is one of the best match-play stretches I have ever had. I didn’t get off to the best starts, but I hung in there.”

   That trophy is the Peg Burnett Trophy and Tall is the first Spring-Ford member to put his name on it.

   Tall, the Central League champion as a junior in the fall of 2016 and a third-place finisher last fall, lost the second and third holes to fall 2-down.

   But making pars has been a pretty good strategy for Tall the last two weeks and it worked again Thursday. He won the fourth and fifth holes with pars to even the match.

   Mirams briefly regained the lead when he buried a 12-foot birdie putt at the par-3 sixth, but it was the last hole he would win.

   Tall won the seventh with a par, the eighth with a bogey and the ninth with a birdie to turn a 1-down deficit into a 2-up advantage.

   Tall won the 12^th with a par to stretch is advantage to 3-up and closed out the match on the 15^th with, what else, a par.

   To get to the final, Tall had to get past Austin Barbin, a Junior Players Club entry from Elkton, Md., in the semifinals Thursday morning. Like Tall, Barbin, a senior at Red Lion Christian Academy, earned a spot in match play at the Philly Am and won his first-round match.

   But Tall’s consistency enabled him to pull out a 1-up victory over Barbin and advance to the final.

   Mirams took advantage of some mistakes by Rolling Green Golf Club’s A.J. Aivazoglou, who helped The Haverford School capture the Inter-Ac League title last fall, to claim a 3 and 2 victory in the other semifinal match.

   The first-flight final featured a matchup of two of the top freshman players in Pennsylvania high school golf last fall.

   Phoenixville Country Club’s Morgan Lofland, a teammate of Tall’s at Conestoga, made it a Pioneer sweep of the championship flight and the first flight with a 2 and 1 victory over The Springhaven Club’s Ryan McCabe.

   Lofland earned a trip to the PIAA Class AAA Championship to cap his freshman campaign. McCabe was the District One Class AA individual champion and led Devon Prep to the district team title. McCabe earned a ticket to the PIAA Class AA Championship.

   Lofland reached the final with a 6 and 5 victory over Gulph Mills Golf Club’s Sam Walker, a teammate of Aivazoglou’s on Haverford School’s Inter-Ac League championship team.

   McCabe had to chip in for birdie on the 18^th hole to get past Joshua Ryan, a Junior Players Club entry, 1-up, in the other semifinal.

   Ryan, who won GAP’s Junior-Junior crown last summer, was another of the top freshmen in the state last fall. Ryan, who is home-schooled by Commonwealth Connections Academy, plays on the Norristown High golf team and, like Lofland, reached the PIAA Class AAA Championship.