December 19 Scramble Tournament Back Nine winners, left to right: Brian Rothwell, Joe Nasal, Mickey Osterneck; Not pictured: Steve Schwartz
Erv Stein
On Dec. 19, 2024, 136 PCM9GA golfers celebrated the festive 2024 holiday season and excellent late fall weather conditions by participating in our Holiday Scramble Tournament at our Tuscany Falls East course.
A total of 34 foursome teams, divided into front nine and back nine flights, utilized the scramble format with team scoring based upon the best drive or pitch or putt for each hole. To assure a truly fair playing field for all teams, the team result for each foursome received net adjustments based upon the prevailing team cumulative handicaps with the higher handicapped teams receiving more adjustments as indicated to assure a level playing field.
Of the three PebbleCreek golf courses, while opinions vary quite widely, our Tuscany Falls East course is probably the least challenging. That being said, of the four par 5 holes for Tuscany Falls East, hole number 9 and hole number 18 each offer significant water, sand, and other hazards and while par gross scores for these holes often are attained by more experienced golfers, birdies are often quite rare for holes 9 and 18.
As usual, typically highly competent PCM9GA pairing committee members assured that the competition was very tight and close. For example, for the front nine, three teams attained quite awesome net 28 scores, 8 under par, and tie-breaking rules were necessary to separate the first place team from the other two teams with identical scores. Likewise, two back nine teams attained even more superior net 26 net scores, 10 under par, and the third-place team attained a 27, 9 under par team score.
Kudos to the first-place winners for both the front and back nine winners as follows:
Front Nine, Tuscany East First Place: John Howell, Randy Prinz, Ken Whitney, Dale Erickson, 8 under par, net 28
Back Nine, Tuscany East First Place: Joe Nasal, Brian Rothwell, Steve Schwartz, Mickey Osterneck, 10 under par, net 26
Closest To Pin and Longest Putt Winners: John Peehl, Barry Taschner, Randy Prinz, Dave Jansen, Albert Williams, Joe Oliver
Following our scramble tournament event, many of us gathered at the newly opened Westwind outdoor bar table area. For those golfers which joined us, winning team members were congratulated and photos were taken.
Our PCM9GA’s exciting events for the first quarter of 2025 include our first ever Match Play Event that began on Jan. 16, which consists of a 5-week completive play. Winning players will advance for the succeeding rounds with a final winner being declared for the final Match Play event on March 6. Our Club Championship events will be held Feb. 2 and Feb. 9.
Red Flight winners, left to right: Phillip Stegmann, Alan Hatfield, Randy Prinz, and Dan Peterson