Link to the championship page, results: GAM Four-Ball
In photo: Nicholas Carbary, left, and Jack Versau, hold the championship plaque that will soon include their names.
ANN ARBOR – Nicholas Carbary of Kalamazoo and Jack Versau of Portage, a pair of private accountants, teamed up for a 7-under 65 to win the afternoon wave and overall title in the 6th GAM Four-Ball Championship presented by Chemical Bank Monday at Travis Pointe Country Club.
“It is really cool,” said Carbary, 30. “We have been playing in GAM events for a long time and it is so challenging to even contend in these. To win is pretty special. To do it with this guy is pretty cool, too.”
Carbary, who played collegiate golf at Eastern Michigan University, and Versau, who played one year at Western Kentucky, have been teaming up in Kalamazoo events, including two-player events and in league play for several years. Carbary has won a couple of Kalamazoo area amateur titles.
“We know each other’s games pretty well,” said Versau, 29.
Jay Overy of Wolverine Lake and Keith Hazely of Beverly Hills played in the same foursome with the winners and finished one shot back with a 66 to earn runner-up trophies.
“We couldn’t have played with a better group,” Carbary said. “They pushed us all day. We were behind most of the day. We stayed busy just trying to beat the team we were playing with. We didn’t think about beating anybody else.”
Morning wave winners were also crowned, but it took a two-team playoff at 3-under 69.
Chad Johnson of Livonia, a medical supplies salesman an assistant golf coach at Wayne State University, teamed up with one of his players, redshirt junior Sean Niles from Northview, and won on the second hole of a playoff with a par.
They turned back the team of Saline’s Mike Ignasiak and Dan Greener, who earned a runner-up trophy.
A field of 50 two-golfer teams with combined GAM/USGA Handicap Indexes under 10.8 competed in the two waves of 18-hole best-ball.
Versau said they were dinging and donging along in the round and finally pulled in front on their final nine holes.
“We didn’t have any bad holes,” he said. “We had a couple of scary ones, but we were able to make pars. I think that was the key. When one of us was out of a hole, the other guy saved par.”
Carbary said the biggest hole came on No. 17.
“Jack went first all day and he hit a shot like two feet from out-of-bounds,” he said. “Then I flew it right, into the hazard. Luckily Jack made a par. That was our biggest scare of the day.”
Johnson, 33, and Niles, 20, predicted that their 69 wouldn’t hole up for the overall title.
“We didn’t make any putts, and we made a bogey,” Johnson said as the afternoon wave was teeing off. “Somebody will get it going and do something silly out there.”
Finishing just behind the two playoff teams in the morning wave were the teams of Jonathan Larsen of Brighton and Dale Smith of Howell, and Michael Detizio of South Lyon and Easton Powers of Milford. Both teams shot 70.
In the Afternoon Wave, third went to the teams of Greg Davies of West Bloomfield and Andrew Smith of Troy, and Anthony Sorentino of Rochester Hills and Dov Lustig of West Bloomfield. Each team shot 67.
-Greg Johnson, [email protected]