Applebrook Golf Club head pro Dave McNabb nearly added a second Philadelphia Senior PGA Professional Championship victory to the one he won in 2018 last year at Concord Country Club.
McNabb lost in a playoff to John Pillar, the director of golf at the Country Club at Woodloch Springs whose victory in the Philadelphia Senior PGA Professional Championship was his second straight.
This time, however, McNabb got the job done. Jumping out to a two-shot lead with a sparkling 5-under-par 67 in the opening round Tuesday at Huntsville Golf Club in Shavertown, McNabb grinded out a 1-over 73 in Wednesday’s second round and edged Pillar and Bucknell Golf Club’s Brian Kelly by a shot to capture a second win in the Philadelphia Senior PGA Professional Championship, presented by Cadillac.
McNabb heads a group of six players who will represent the Philadelphia Section PGA in the Senior PGA Professional Championship, which tees off Oct. 21 at the PGA Golf Club in Port St. Lucie, Fla. The top 35 finishers at the PGA Golf Club will earn a spot in next spring’s KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship, one of the PGA Tour Champions’ major championships, which will be held at the Harbor Shores Resort in Benton Harbor, Michl.
McNabb, Pillar and Dave Quinn of Laurel Creek Country Club represented the Philadelphia Section in the Senior PGA Championship earlier this year at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Okla.
McNabb has been one of the top club pros in the Philadelphia region of any age for a while. He was 51 when he nearly won the 2017 PGA Professional Championship, falling in a playoff at the Sunriver Resort in Oregon to former PGA Tour player Omar Uresti. That wasn’t the senior club pro, that was the tournament for the younger club pros, the one that gets you into the PGA Championship and the runnerup finish earned McNabb a spot in the field in the 2017 PGA Championship at the Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, N.C.
McNabb’s opening round at Huntsville started quietly enough as he birdied the first hole and made a bogey at four. But then he went on a birdie binge, making four straight at the ninth, 10th, 11th and 12th holes and adding a fifth birdie at 15 to get it in at 5-under.
McNabb struggled a little in comparison in his second round. He birdied the second hole, made a bogey at 10, but birdied 13 to get it to 6-under. Bogeys at the 14th and 18th holes left him with a 4-under 140 total. Pillar, who had opened with a 1-over 73 and made his move in Wednesday’s final round with a 4-under 68, but couldn’t quite catch McNabb as he finished at 3-under 141.
Kelly was McNabb’s closest pursuer after an opening round of 3-under 69. He matched par in the second round with a 72 as he also came up a shot behind McNabb at 3-under 141.
“We had a great field of great champions and great players,” McNabb told the Philadelphia Section PGA website after his victory. “It was a fun day and I stayed in the moment, which was key.”
McNabb had been playing some good golf lately as he beat his fellow Philadelphia Section seniors in last month’s Skee Riegel Senior Open at Radnor Valley Country Club. He finished in a tie for fifth place in the 100th Philadelphia PGA Professional Championship, which was held at his home course of Applebrook and at Aronimink Golf Club.
Huntsville was in PGA Tour shape as it had become the emergency site for the Forme Tour Championship after The Ridge at Back Brook had been ravaged by the remnants of Hurricane Ida. The Forme Tour was a temporary tour for non-Canadian PGA Tour Canada players who were unable to travel to Canada because of that country’s severe restrictions on visitors from other countries due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Terry Hertzog, an instructor at Merion Golf Club, added a solid 3-under 69 to his opening-round 75 to finish alone in fourth place, three shots behind Pillar and Kelly at even-par 144.
The final two guaranteed berths to the Senior PGA Professional Championship out of the Philadelphia Section went to Terry Hatch of Royal Oaks Golf Course and Eddie Perrino of the Eagle Rock Resort, both of whom landed on 1-over 145. Hatch matched par in the second round with a 72 after opening with a 73. Perrino opened with a solid 1-under 71 before adding a 74 in Wednesday’s final round.
Quinn will be the first alternate to the Senior PGA Professional Championship as he carded a pair of 73s for a 2-over 146 total. In addition to teeing it up in the Senior PGA Championship at Southern Hills this year, Quinn also earned a spot in the field for the U.S. Senior Open at Omaha Country Club in Omaha, Neb.
The ageless George Forster got off to a good start with a 2-under 70 before falling back with a 76 that left him in a tie for seventh place with Quinn at 2-over 146. Forster will be the second alternate for the Senior PGA Professional Championship, an event he has played in about a dozen times.
The third alternate was Bill Walker of Riverton Country Club as he added a 1-under 71 to his opening-round 76 to finish in a tie for ninth place with Hugo Mazzalupi of Patriots Glen National Golf Club at 3-over 147.
Mazzalupi, who survived two cuts and played four rounds in last spring’s PGA Professional Championship at the PGA Golf Club, carded a final-round 75 after matching par in the opening round with a 72. He will be the fourth alternate.
The fifth and final alternate spot to the Senior PGA Professional Championship belongs to John Appleget of Indian Spring Country Club as he finished in 11th place at 4-over 148 after matching par in the opening round at Huntsville with a 72 before adding a 76 in the second round.
Don DeAngelis topped the Super Senior leaderboard as he opened with a 3-under 69 before adding a 76 for a 1-over 145 total. Marjorie Jones of The Shore Club was the runnerup as she added a 78 to her opening-round 76 for a 10-over 154 total.
It was probably just a quirk in the schedule, but it turned into a week to celebrate the incredible amount of over-50 talent the Philadelphia region boasts.
It started in Point Clear, Ala., where Sunnybrook Golf Club’s Lisa McGill, Merion Golf Club’s Loraine Jones and Angie Whitley Coleman of Wilmington, Del. all earned spots in the match-play bracket in the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championship at The Lakewood Club.
Monday and Tuesday, Chip Lutz of Reading and LedgeRock Golf Club, proved, at age 66, that he is still one of the best senior amateur golfers around with an impressive six-shot victory over two-time defending champion Chris Fieger Sr. of Denver, Lancaster County in the Golf Association of Philadelphia’s Senior Amateur Championship at the Country Club of Scranton.
Lutz and Fieger, representing the Philadelphia area, had both earned spots in the match-play bracket in the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship a week earlier at the Country Club of Detroit, Lutz making a run to the quarterfinals.
A day after Lutz’s victory at the Country Club of Scranton, McNabb was crowned the Philadelphia Senior PGA Professional Championship winner at Huntsville. They are older than 50, in some cases older than 60, and still playing golf at a high level.
No comments:
Post a Comment