Third Time's a Charm for Tim
Austyn Karle of Scottsdale, AZ (2007) fired an opening round of 4 under par on Friday to take the lead at the Tucson Jr. Golf Classic. He followed up on Saturday with a round of 3 under par 70 and led Tim McKenney of Scottsdale, AZ (2006) by one stroke going into the final round. McKenney who has won multiple times on the FCWT, had never won the boys 16-18 division at Tucson. Not until this year. On Sunday, McKenney, a senior, made sure that he would add the Tucson Championship to his collection of FCWT awards. He fired the Low Round of the day with a 2 under par 71 and won the event by 4 strokes over Karle. McKenney, who has signed a Letter of Intent to the University of Florida had 12 birdies for the event and 38 pars for the event. What won the event for McKenney was his Par 5 performance where he was 9 under for the event. Karle's second place finish is his second Top 3 in as many weeks - his win will come!
Finishing in third place was last weekend's Sun Devil winner, David Hahn of Henderson, NV (2007). Hahn who pulled out a miracle chip in during a playoff hole last weekend, started the final round 3 strokes back of McKenney and 4 shots out of the lead. His final round of 74 put him 2 strokes behind Karle. After firing a 71 on Saturday, the FCWT 2005 13-15 Player of the Year, Gregor Main of Danville, CA (2008) put himself in 4th place going into Sunday's final round. He would finish T4 with James Dalthorp III of Los Angeles, CA, who rebounded from his second round score of 79 to post a third round of 75 and finish at 224 for the event.
Thirteen year old Danielle Frasier of Encinitas, CA, took the first round lead at the Tucson Junior Golf Classic, hoping never to look back. However on Saturday, Alexandrea Schulte of Broken Arrow, OK (2006) changed all that. Miss Schulte pulled within one stroke of Miss Frasier with one round left to play. On Sunday, Schulte fell back with a round of 85, but Ashley McKenney made a charge of her own. Ashley carded the Low Round of 74 in this division and charged up the leaderboard to 2nd place. She also led this division in pars with 36 for the event. It wasn't enough to catch Danielle Frasier, who won by 4 strokes. Danielle, who finished 3rd here last season, showed that she can handle the pressure of leading for 3 rounds - quite an accomplishment for one so young.
Alexandrea Schulte of Broken Arrow, OK (2006) finished in 3rd place followed by Andrea Watts of Lone Tree, CO (2008), who led this division in birdies with 7, and Kaitlin Drolson of Rancho Santa Fe, CA (2008) who also started the day in 4th.
In the 13-15 division, Parker Houston of Rancho Santa Fe, CA (2010), led wire-to-wire to earn his first FCWT victory of the season. On Friday Parker fired a 3 under par 70 to lead all scores by 4 strokes. On Saturday he added two birdies to his previous 6 for a total of 8 for the event. On Sunday, he posted a final round 80, but had given himself enough of a lead that he still finished 6 strokes ahead of Joshua Creel of Cheyenne, WY. Joshua, who carded the only eagle of the day on Friday, began Sunday's round tied for second with Erik Newkirk of Las Vegas, NV (2008) and 6 strokes back of Houston. He finished Sunday's round in the same position. |
