South Posts Surprising Golf Victory

This was supposed to be the year the North finally won the Orange County Senior All-Star golf match.

The North seemed to have stronger players, among them John Lee and James Wooley of Southern Section champion Valencia and Sunny Hills’ Jenny Lee, the defending CIF-Southern California Golf Assn. girls’ champion.

The talk around the tee box Thursday at Newport Beach Country Club was that after six years of domination by the South, the North would win in a walkover.

That was before the match. Afterward, the South was still standing. It routed the North, 16-8, in the seventh annual tournament, sponsored by the Southern California PGA.

“I looked at the names in the paper,” said Jimmy Lee of Tustin High and the South, “and I thought, ‘Oh gosh, how bad is this going to be? How bad are we going to get killed?’ But I decided to go out and do what I can do and we ended up winning.

“It’s a pretty good feeling when you win as underdogs.”

Lee, who shot one-over-par 72, and Los Amigos’ John Cone were the only players to sweep their opponents in the scoring system that combined stroke and match play.

Each player competed against his or her counterpart in a stroke-play round and two-person teams played a best-ball match. A total of six points was possible in each foursome.

Cone, a replacement for a late scratch, Capistrano Valley’s Scott Rynders, was just happy to be on the course. “I haven’t played in a month,” Cone said. “I got the call last night.”

Cone was able to pull his game together well enough to shoot 85 and beat his opponent, Dan Orris of Ocean View, by five shots. El Dorado’s Tim Allen shot 84.

As expected, Valencia’s Lee and Wooley set the pace. Each shot one-under 70, the low rounds of the day, but only one other North golfer broke 80.

That was Wooley’s partner, Alex Yi of La Quinta, who shot 79. Yi and Wooley won four of the six possible points, the only North players finishing on the plus side, beating Foothill’s Chris Beiler (86) and Woodbridge’s Scott Nelson (74), 4-2.

John Lee was paired with Jenny Lee (no relation), who struggled to an 80. “I played terrible,” said Jenny, who will attend Texas on a full scholarship. “I gave up after two double bogeys I had on the front nine.”

John Lee, who made a 30-yard chip shot for an eagle on the first hole, had an up-and-down beginning. “I started eagle, bogey, birdie, bogey, birdie,” said Lee, who plans to play at Saddleback College.

Newport Harbor’s Morgan Anderson (76) and Los Amigos’ Matt Stafford (79) played just solidly enough to win, 4-2. The teams were even in match play going into the 17th hole, a par-3. Stafford gave his team the lead with a 15-foot birdie putt.

“Both of them [the Lees] missed the green, so it was wide open for us,” Stafford said. “I put it on the green and made that putt.”

Jesse Hayden (76) and Sean Taeger (80), both from El Toro, beat El Modena’s Sean Brocklebank (81) and Huntington Beach’s Jeff Farley (83), 4-2, in the other foursome.

For Jimmy Lee, who is John Lee’s cousin, the victory was a nice finish to a promising season that ended in disappointment. Lee was medalist in every dual match for Tustin this season, but faltered in the Golden West League finals, finished third by one stroke and therefore missed the postseason.

“Basically, all my goals were shot after that,” said Lee, who finished fourth in the CIF-SCGA tournament as a junior.

Lee said he put away his clubs for weeks after the frustrating performance at Green River (He was two under after 11 holes, but bogeyed the final five holes, missing putts from about four feet each time.) He started playing again when he learned he had made the all-star team, but still isn’t practicing very often.

“This just shows that I can still play,” said Lee, who accepted an appointment to West Point. “This helps. It’s a pretty good feeling. I’m getting over the league finals thing by looking forward to what I’m going to do in the future.”