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Daniel Davis Tops the Money List at Portland Season Kickoff
APT Portland began the season on October 4th with a visit to the Greenback Course at Heron Lakes. The Robert Trent Jones Jr. design, which hosted the U.S. Amateur Public Links in 1979, features tree-lined fairways and six lakes that come into play on nearly every hole.
It’s an ideal setup for accurate hitters, but missing your target by even a few yards could be the difference between bogey and triple. The course played tough, and not a single player made it through the day without a double bogey or worse on their card.
Division Breakdown
It was all Paavo Happala in Division 1, who put together a solid round highlighted by a pair of birdies on the back nine. Paavo’s effort earned him a cool 150 Player of the Year points.
Division 2 was a closely contested affair, but it was Benjamin Ciobanu who pulled away from the field thanks to a 40 on the back nine. Ciobanu was neck and neck with Matt Sourichone, but his play on the par 3s turned out to be the difference, playing them two strokes better than Sourichone.
It was a fight until the end in Division 3, with Tony Bautista defeating Jackson Rotzien by a single stroke. Standing on the 18th tee one shot back, Bautista flipped the script with a par while Rotzien made double.
The first tournament of the year also brought the first playoff. After 18 holes, Naruhisa Oda and Daniel Davis remained tied after both firing +8 (80) and combining for five birdies during regulation. Oda went on to defeat Davis in the playoff to capture the Division 4 title and the largest single-division prize of the day.
Division 5 was another tight battle, with Jesus Jared Soria posting an 86, including a 43 on the back nine, to defeat Mauricio Sanchez, who shot 88 with a 45 on the back. While the back nine proved to be the difference, it was Soria’s two birdies on the front that kept him in contention.
Scott Boyd may have come up empty in Division 4, but his –1 net score was enough to win the Mid-Amateur Net Division. Despite a late push by Mauricio Sanchez, the lead Boyd built on the front nine, where he shot –3, was too big of a deficit to overcome.
There was no need for a playoff in the Senior Net Division, as Daniel Davis ran away with it, besting the next closest competitor by 11 strokes. Davis had a stretch early in the round of –4 over three holes that set him up to cruise to an easy win.
Top Money Winners
One thing we can take away from the season opener is that it doesn’t necessarily take winning your gross division to finish with more than double the payout of the second-place finisher when there’s also net competition and skins up for grabs.
- Daniel Davis walked away with $340. Davis may have come up short in the Division 4 playoff, but winning a net division, two skins, and two super skins made for a pretty good day.
- In the same light, Mauricio Sanchez also fared well. Finishing runner-up in Division 5 and the Mid-Amateur Net Division didn’t stop him from cashing in elsewhere. Add in a skin and a super skin, and it meant leaving with $152.50.
- Naruhisa Oda and Scott Boyd made the most of their only appearances on the winner sheet, collecting $120 and $115 for winning the Division 4 and Mid-Amateur Net Divisions, respectively.
Best of the Day
- It’s not often someone wins five skins on their own, but that’s exactly what Norman Davis did in the Division 1/2 contest, capping off an impressive showing to start the season.
