Manila Southwoods romps pressure-free to 4-peat

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines — With a comfortable 20-point lead heading into the final day, Manila Southwoods just needed to hang on to pull off a rare four-peat in the Philippine Airlines Interclub Golf Tournament here.

But the history-chasing squad preferred to close this one out with a bang.

Saving its best for last, Southwoods pooled a concluding 146 points at the Negros Occidental Golf and Country Club to run away with a whopping 41-point win over Luisita yesterday and stay on course to joining Canlubang in the record books as the only five-peat champs of the annual meet.

Three stalwarts broke par – Taisei Shimizu (three-under 67 for 39 points), Chepe Dulay (2-under 68 for 38) and Yuto Katsuragawa (one-under 69 for 37) – while Jun-jun Plana turned in a 74 for 32 markers as the Carmona-based squad put the finishing touches to another dominating campaign.

“Going to today (yesterday), I had a comfortable sleep because of the 20-point lead and I’m very confident with the team I was fielding,” said SW non-playing captain Thirdy Escaño. 

Southwoods moved one away from matching the longest championship streak achieved by Cangolf in 2006-10.

“We’ll take it one step at a time. The only thing I can promise is I will continue building the Southwoods team, field a competitive team next year. I can’t say we’ll get a five-peat, I’d be happy to have a five-peat but we’ll give it a good fight,” said Escaño, whose team will lose Tom Kim and Jama Reyes to the pros.

Southwoods set the tone for this one-sided romp with a 140-point effort on opening day also at the Marapara layout. The team followed it up with a 139 and 126 over at Bacolod Golf and Country Club (Binitin) course as the rest of the field couldn’t keep up.

“As I said in first day, I’m sure my players will break 140 the second time they come over (to Marapara),” said  Escaño “They all delivered; I can’t ask for a better team. I’m very happy how the players played.”

Not given much attention in the pre-tournament, Luisita made its presence felt with a solid showing throughout en route to a second-best 510 aggregate. The Tarlac-based squad, a mix of veterans and teeners, finished ahead of Canlubang (510) and Del Monte (502).

Rodel Mangulabnan (33), Don Petil (31) Dan Emilio Cruz (31) and Jingy Tuason (30) joined forces in a fourth round 125 for the Luisitans. 

The Sugar Barons carded 133 built on Jolo Magcalayo’s 36, Luis Castro’s 35, Rupert Zaragoza’s 32 and Jonas Magcalayo’s 30 while Del Monte closed with 119 behind Noel Langamin’s 33, Arsenio Mondilla’s 30, Roroy Miñoza’s 29, and Julius Langamin’s 27.