Liebler-Sylvan Capture Playoff for Mid-Am Four-Ball Title

Blythewood, SC – The team of Steve Liebler-Gus Sylvan hung on to their first round lead and captured the SCGA’s Mid-Am Four-Ball Championship in a playoff over the team of Robert Dargan and Brad Krapfel. The event was held over the 6770 yard, par 72 Windermere Club in Blythewood, SC.

Holding a one stroke lead after a first round score of 65, Liebler-Sylvan used three birdies on the front nine to increase their lead to two strokes with nine to play as Dargan-Krapfel turned at 34 after a first round 66.

Both teams made birdie on the par 5 tenth, before Liebler-Sylvan made their first mistake of the day. A bogey by Sylvan-Liebler at 11 and a birdie by Dargan moved the two teams into a tie with seven to play. A birdie by Sylvan at twelve, moved his team into a one shot lead.

Birdies by both teams at the short par 4, 14th and pars at the long 15th set the stage for the final three holes. Krapfel holed a twenty foot putt for birdie at sixteen and watched as Sylvan could not convert his birdie from eight feet. The teams were now tied with two holes to play. With their partners in the water at seventeen, Sylvan and Krapfel halved the hole with pars.

The eighteenth had been a birdie hole for most of the field the entire day. Dargan found the water off the tee, but laced a fairway wood onto the green for a birdie putt after his drop. Liebler laid back of the treacherous green with his second, while Sylvan missed the green short and right and found the bunker. Both Liebler and Sylvan hit their third shots to within ten feet. Dargan left his twenty five footer just short and neither Liebler nor Sylvan could convert their putt for birdie.

The ensuing playoff went back to the eighteenth hole. All four players drove it in the fairway, and all but Sylvan laid up. Krapfel missed the green long with his third. Liebler’s approach was twenty feet and Dargan left it just outside of Liebler. Sylvan wedged his third to about five feet. Sylvan watched as the other three players missed. Sylvan then stepped up and centered the putt for the championship.