August 2021 Ohio Golf Journal

NOPGA JACKSON-DIEKEN PLAYERS OF THE YEAR One of the highlights of the NOPGA Junior Golf Series is the season- long points race for the Jackson-Dieken Player of the Year Award. Junior golfers, who compete in NOPGA Junior Series events earn points from their finishes throughout the summer. In 2021 Dean Upholzer from Strongsville was named Player of the Year in the Boys 11-15 age group and Jordan Kish, from Massillon won the Boys 16-19. For the Girls, Kent’s Madolyn Kost earned Player of the Year in the 11-15 group and Sophia Rosa from Canton was 16-19 Player of the Year. Girls 16-19 Mary Mulchay, from Lima, finished runner-up in this event last year. She held the first round lead with a 1-over 73 and finished the second round one shot better than Halena’s Sydney Leyerle to win the 16-19 age group this year. Mulchay will enter Findlay University in the fall after graduating from Lima Central Catholic. Girls 11-15 A Sophomore at Strongsville High School, Natalie Kostalnick fired a 1-under par 35 on her final nine holes to rally from a 3-shot deficit to earn a 2-shot victory in the biggest comeback of the tournament. Kostalnick, who began the day in fourth place after an opening 85, put the finishing touches on her stellar comeback with three birdies, two pars and one bogey on her final six holes for a final-round of 2-over 74 to claim the victory over runner-up Madolyn Kost from Kent. Boys 11-15 After sharing the first-round lead with a 4-over 76, Chris Pollak, from Aurora, fired a second-round 4-under 68 – which included an eagle on the 579-yard 15th hole and a chip-in birdie from 35 feet on the par-3 eighth — to win by a whopping nine shots. Pollak, who will be a freshman at Archbishop Hoban, bogeyed the second hole but reeled off three birdies over the next seven to make the turn in 2-under 34. A bogey on the 11th was made null and void when he birdied the par-3 13th by making a 10-foot and followed with an eagle two holes later. After hitting what he called his best drive of the tournament, Pollak said he had 178 yards to the hole. The left-hander hit 8-iron downwind to a tidy three feet and made the putt. Strongsvilles’s Dean Upholzer, who won the Jackson-Dieken Player-of-the-Year for the age group, and Braden Herstich, from Akron, both finished at 9-over 153 to share runner-u[p.