PORTSMOUTH _ Normally, making a bogey in a highly competitive Four-Ball Tournament means big trouble. But not if the bogey comes after that team already has made 10 birdies. That is what Sean Fitzpatrick and Mike Willock did Monday in earning a spot in the USGA’s national Four-Ball Championship. Fitzpatrick, who is from Walpole, Mass., and Willock, from Cohasset, Mass., combined to register a nine-under-par 62 at Carnegie Abbey’s bayside course to top a 60-team field. Their work earns them a spot in the second annual USGA Four-Ball that will be held next spring at Winged Foot in Westchester, N.Y. Willock and Fitzpatrick were perfect teams as each was credited with five birdies, although there were two other holes when both birdied, thus only one counted. Early in their round, the team ran off five straight birds so that even when both bogeyed their 17th hole, a 186-yard par-3, it did not stop them from claiming the top spot. Scoring was very low on the 70 degree, windless day along the bay. The two other teams to advance were the team of Craig Chapman and Curtis Jordan, both of Maine, who recorded a bogey-free 63, and the Massachusetts team of Ryan Riley and Adam Rubin, which had a 64. The low RIGA member was Interscholastic League champion Will Dickson, who combined with partner Kyle Parsons to record a 66. The Rhode Island team of Bobby Leopold and Brad Valois, which competed in the inaugural event this past May at The Olympic Club in San Francisco shot a 67 that included back-to-back bogeys in the middle of their round. Rhode Island Amateur champion Kevin Silva and his partner, Matthew Crenshaw of Burlington, N.C., also were in the tie for eighth at 67.
