Hanover High’s Phin Choukas will miss the New Hampshire Golf Association amateur championship at Keene’s Bretwood Golf Course this week. He has a good excuse.
Choukas is in Ireland for the week to play in the Kerry Cup, a golf and social excursion open to as many as 64 high school golfers willing to foot the bill and make the trek. Choukas, who will be a senior on the Marauders’ golf team this fall, will get to work with a variety of college coaches, many with Ivy League and NESCAC ties, including one with whom he might be familiar.
“It’s an incredible experience for a kid; I can’t explain it,” said Dartmouth College men’s golf coach Rich Parker, who is returning to Ireland to work at the Kerry Cup for the fourth time. “Any kid that goes on that trip, they’ve never done anything like that. The weather, the course, you get put on a team with 11 other kids … it’s an amazing experience.”
The Kerry Cup takes place at Waterville Golf Links, an 18-hole seaside layout in County Kerry, on Ireland’s southwest coast. Parker arrived there on Saturday; he’s been an instructor for the length of the Kerry Cup’s existence.
The event is the brainchild of Michael Maher, who’s tried to bring to high school golf an experience similar to those he’s led in high school hockey. Currently the headmaster at the Northwood School in Lake Placid, N.Y., Maher has been a teacher, coach or administrator at Connecticut and Massachusetts prep schools and is the founder of National Hockey Training, an elite summer program. Maher played college hockey at the University of Vermont.
In addition to receiving instruction from a bevy of college coaches, golfers will also engage in a 72-hole tournament on a course dating back to the late 19th century. Renowned course architect Tom Fazio oversaw a course redesign about a decade ago. Each day closes with a seminar on topics including NCAA recruiting regulations, college admissions procedures and other important information.
It costs participants more than $4,000 to make the trip, but given the amenities involved, the level of coaching and the memories and relationships likely to be built, Parker sees it as a unique opportunity.
“If Phin goes over there and plays his game, shows a ton of character and good sportsmanship and is a good person,” Parker said, “when he gets home, he’ll have a place to play golf.”
Choukas made the quarterfinals of match play at the N.H. Amateur two years ago at the Mount Washington Resort. He fell in the first round of match play last summer at Laconia Country Club to his older brother, Nate, who will be a senior at Connecticut’s Trinity College this fall and who will also miss this week’s state championship because of a summer work commitment in Boston.
Dorset All Set: The Vermont Golf Association is bringing its state am to the Dorset Field Club this week, and Hartford High graduate Zach Temple is anticipating a challenge.
This Vermont Am is the first since 1912 for Dorset, which bills itself as “the oldest continually operating golf club in America,” according to its website. Dorset’s history goes back to 1886, although it didn’t become an 18-hole facility until 1999. It’s not very long — only 6,194 yards from the tips — but Temple isn’t deceived.
“The greens are small; the course is short, but it has almost like a Champlain (Country Club) feel,” said Temple, referencing the Swanton course that hosted the Vermont Am two years ago. “The greens will be lightning, like normal, with some tough pins. You have to be able to hit shots that are rewarding. It’ll bit you quite a bit with long fescue. There are bunkers scattered everywhere. It’s a good test, looking at it. The place is pure.”
Temple, 22, who graduated from Castleton University this spring, can claim some knowledge of the course from his Hartford days; Dorset is the home track for nearby Burr & Burton Academy. It won’t be as brutal a test as last year’s eight-miles-down-the-road host, Ekwanok Country Club, where Jay Peak’s Bryan Smith won with a 1-over-par 281 over three days and 72 holes. Temple played a practice round at Dorset recently, but he wasn’t ready to peg a potential winning score.
“I’m trying not to put a number in my head,” said Temple, who has been splitting his days as a part-time Taylor Made rep and working in the Hanover Country Club pro shop. “In my practice round, I don’t know if I finished a single hole. I’m trying not to grind and just figure out what I need to do.”
Temple is the lone Upper Valley golfer in the field who didn’t have to go through qualifying; a top-30 finish at Ekwanok guaranteed Temple’s slot. He’ll be joined at Dorset by Woodstock’s Justen Maxham and Alex Moore, Montague’s Bob Moreau, Lake Morey’s Ryan Landgraf and Quechee’s Mak Lyford (a former Temple teammate at Hartford) and Dustin Perry, all of whom earned spots through qualifying tournaments.
The top 40 and ties after Wednesday’s second round will play 36 holes on Thursday to determine this year’s state champ.
Bretwood Revisited: With the Choukas brothers out and past champion Nick MacDonald from Hanover Country Club, a quarterfinalist last year, not in the field, Upper Valley representation at the N.H. Am this week is down to about a half-dozen competitors.
The group includes Carter’s Andy Hunnewell, Claremont’s Zach Melcher and T.J. Barber, Hanover newcomer Sylvain Foster, Lake Sunapee’s Bobby Williams and Baker Hill’s Jim Jankowski, the former Dartmouth hockey goaltending teammate of current Big Green coach Bob Gaudet. Speaking of the college on the hill, Dartmouth graduate and 2011 state am semifinalist James Pleat is also in the field.
The NHGA is bringing the 114th edition of its signature event back to Bretwood for the first time since 2000. The tournament, which begins with the first of two stroke-play rounds today, will take place on Bretwood North, which will play to 6,700 today and Tuesday before lengthening to 6,900 yards for match play.
The championship is wide open, with last year’s winner, Laconia’s Chris Houston, having turned pro this year.
Greg Fennell can be reached at gfennell@vnews.com or 603-727-3226.