AVERILL PARK – With the leaves coming down, how many people sweep their feet to find a ball not in the fairway? Most of us.

Do we call a penalty if we accidentally kick it? Usually not. It’s just a byproduct of fall golf.
 
Dan Ireland of Wynantskill did on Sunday and it almost cost his team the match. But he and his partner John Cooney of Brunswick say it was the right thing to do.
 
“Anybody who loves golf would have loved what happened out there (Sunday),” Cooney said. “It was really solid golf for both teams.”

Cooney and Ireland avenged a loss earlier in the golf season to Cody Bielawa and Greg Levings, 3 & 2, to win the “Hutch” Two-Man Match Play championship at Burden Lake Country Club, a three-day event.
 
The penalty stroke came at a critical time. With Cooney and Ireland two-up after 13, Ireland was searching for his ball at the 470-yard par-5 14th. It was under some leafs and he accidentally kicked it but he called a penalty on himself, effectively taking himself out of the hole. It led to a team bogey and they were just one-up.

“It was a great event,” Ireland said. “The weather was interesting. It got pretty cool and windy.”

They won 15 & 16 with pars (bogeys from Bielawa/Levings) to lock it up.

“I’m just relishing the moment,” Cooney said. “Good day for an old guy.”
FRONT NINE

“It was a good match,” Ireland said. “They were good opponents, good players.” Friday was the qualifier, two matches Saturday and the finals on Sunday.

The finals began with five pars each in the first five holes. A bogey at six dropped Bielawa and Levings one down. Both teams birdied seven. Cooney and Ireland bogeyed eight and halved nine and they were all square.

“Danny was carrying us through the whole front nine,” Cooney said. “After each hole I was getting a little down and wanted to help the team.”
 
These are pairs that know each other well. Levings and Bielawa won this year’s member-member in early August. Cooney and Ireland were second. Cooney and Ireland won it in 2008 over Levings and Bielawa.  Also this golf season, Levings won the BLCC stroke play title July 5. Bielawa won the men’s club championship August 16.
BACK NINE

 
They halved holes 10 & 11 and then Cooney did what he was hoping on the front nine, helped the team.
 
At the par-5, 510-yard 12th, Cooney’s second shot hit a tree near the green and his ball fell to about 85 yards out.

“It may have been a blessing in disguise,” Cooney said.Confident in his wedge play, he smacked a full sand wedge into the wind and put the ball to about a foot.

“That kind of turned the tide,” Cooney said. “It got my confidence up.” On the 13th tee, a 145-yard par-3 up hill, Cooney said he was between clubs – either a hard seven-iron or longer, smoother six-iron. He turned to his partner for advice.

“Don’t push it,” was what Ireland said to him. Cooney hit the six-iron and it disappeared on the green but those gathered saw it.

“Everybody made a big ‘oooh’,” Cooney said. As he got to the green, he saw his ball a couple feet past the hole. The birdie put them two-up. The 14th was the bogey. Cooney and Ireland won holes 15 and 16 with pars to close it out.

“We were a good balancing act,” Ireland said, who plans to keep playing this year “till there’s snow on the ground.”  The tournament was named for longtime BLCC member and friend of the Choquette family Alan Hutchins.

“It was fun, it was great,” Cooney said.
OTHER EVENTS AT BLCC

Other events to come at Burden Lake include The Fall Captain & Crew Saturday, October 24th. Lunch at 11 AM followed by a noon shotgun with food and beverages on the course followed by a buffet dinner ($35 for Members and $55 for non members.)

Their first NFL-Habana Cigar Night is Monday, November 9th at 6 PM with a variety of free cigars supplied by Scott Bendett of the “Habana Cigar Shoppe” in North Greenbush and Albany ($50 prepaid, no walk-ins.)

The annual “Turkey Shoot” Scramble is Saturday, November 14th. It’s a nine-hole scramble at noon with a turkey dinner to follow.

The Annual Awards Dinner is Saturday, November 21.

BLCC’s inaugural “Tailgate Party” is Sunday, December 6th.

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