FARMINGTON, PA – Peter Badawy proves that there are golf gods. On a weekend where many of his teammates were stupid or clueless, the Potomac Cup rookie from McLean, Virginia won all four of his matches – frequently from the anchor position – walked off with the Joe Hardy Most Outstanding Player Award, and as was the poster boy for good sportsmanship during the seventh annual, three day “Maryland vs. Virginia” amateur golf team battle. Virginia breezed through the early singles matches 9-7 taking advantage of a godawful pairings gaffe by the Maryland co-Captains, securing their fourth consecutive cup and seizing a 5-2 series lead.
Behind 15-9 after two days of doubles play and needing eleven out of sixteen points to force a playoff (there is no “tie goes to the defending champion” at the PCup as she is affectionately called), Maryland’s first eight players to go off for the singles were a combined 3-17-4.
The conversation on the Sportstalk 980 radio program was humorous:
Maryland Captain Jeff Sheehan (imitating Ben Crenshaw from the 1999 Ryder Cup): “I’m a big believer in fate and I have a good feeling about tomorrow.”
Jay: “How do you have a good feeling about 3-17-4?”
***cricket! cricket! cricket!***
“It was definitely a welcome surprise to me, when I heard it” remarked Virginia Co-Captain Adam McCaa candidly. “Last year, they front-loaded and we back loaded and they almost stole the Cup.” Of the first eight players, four were 0-3 and a fifth was 0-2-1. Of those five, four were Cup rookies. There was confusion and a lack of deep consideration of the pairings on Maryland’s side. The tournament uses the “President’s Cup formula” where one teams puts up a name, the opponents respond with that opponent, then provide a player for a Maryland response. Rather than front-load and try to cut the deficit early and spur a rally, Co-Captains Vance Welch and John Rhodes seemed more concerned with individual matchups that rarely materialized. Those opening eight men for Maryland went 1-6-1 in singles play on Sunday. Clearly, Maryland needs to improve it’s pairings, especiall in foursomes where they were trounced 10.5 to 1.5 in the last two years.
This year, Virginia Captain Steve Czaban learned from last year’s gaffe and put horses in the front and rear of his lineup. His first four players were a combined 7-4-1 and all four won their matches. Cup rookie Dae Chung – dubbed by Czaban as “The Silent Assassin” sank the cup-clinching putt with in style rolling in a twisting eight-footer after recovering from the worst position on the hole.
After missing a three-foot putt on 17 that would have secured no worse than a tie, Chung hooked his tee shot left into the deepest rough on the course – between 1 and 18 – and at the foot of a sixty foot hill. Completely blind, without even a cloud in the sky to guide him, he hit to twenty yards short of the green, then scraped the winning up-and-down to edge Maryland’s Chris Drescher.
Badawy, who played in the next-to-last group smiled broadly as he finished off a feverishly tough match against U. Maryland senior J.J. Occi, a Maryland Cup rookie who also proved he will be a force for several years for Maryland – as both a player and a well-mannered veteran. Paired in the same group with his son, the father (Michael) of the father-and-son team finished a 4-0-0 weekend to lead Team Red.
Besides, Badawy, Matt Himes went 4-0-0 for Team Blue. Virginia veteran Ross McIntosh went 3-1 over the weekend, losing only his singles match to Maryland’s anchor, Vance Welch. Don Phattiyakul, Chung’s frequent doubles partner over the weekend, tallied a 3-0-1 record.
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