Otto Dunn
The writing appeared to be drying on the wall.
Down 20-3 to Wanganui at halftime in the 2012 Heartland Championship Meads Cup final, it seemed Ngati Porou East Coast and their fans were going to have to settle for second.
One hundred and twenty-nine kilometres away from Ruatoria's hallowed Whakarua Park, a Ngati Porou Gisborne fan's Whitaker Street TV was set to be turned off.
He didn't want to see the Coast get butchered, let alone lose to the defending champions.
But he watched on, almost resignedly so, even when Wanganui went 27-3 ahead with 27 minutes remaining.
When the clock ticked down to 15 minutes to go, the Coast flicked a switch that would end in the Ruatoria faithful saying, “I was there that day”, and those who watched from afar saying, “I wish I was there that day”.
A try to winger TJ Moeke inspired a Coast comeback that would go down in grassroots rugby history.
Stung by an uppercut from out of the sky blue, Wanganui found themselves on the back foot as a reinvigorated Coast took charge.
Their second try was one for the ages. Lively winger Whaimotu Craft-Chemis went on a dazzling run in which he beat an estimated nine players — at least one of them twice — and set up superstar prop Ziggy Fisi'ihoi.
Ten points behind, nine minutes to go, and with the chant “Nati, Nati” ringing around the ground, the Coast continued the onslaught.
Reserve winger Mike King crossed for a try, which lifted the crowd's decibel level to eardrum-shattering, and Irish first five-eighth John Semple's sideline conversion made it 27-24 with three minutes on the clock.
Then came the moment that immortalised the name Verdon Bartlett on the East Coast.
The fullback received the ball from Semple near the touchline, dummied, cut inside, put his head down and charged as hard as he could, crashing over the line for a try that put the Coast 29-27 ahead and sparked a pitch invasion as Nati fans went berserk.
Order was restored, Semple's conversion attempt was wide, the fulltime whistle went, the party started . . . and a rugby fan dancing in front of his screen was awfully happy he didn't push the “off” button.
Twenty-one centuries ago, some resourceful Roman shaped a tree branch into a club and started smacking around a leather ball stuffed with feathers.
Since then, millions have enjoyed/endured what evolved into the sport/torture/soul-destroying addiction called golf and the weird and wonderful shots it continuously produces.
The most famous of those range from “the shot heard around the world” — Gene Sarazen's famous double eagle at the 1935 Masters — to an array of jaw-dropping displays by Tiger Woods.
Who can forget his astonishing triple-breaking chip-in for birdie on Augusta's 16th at the 2005 Masters, or that unthinkable fairway bunker shot over a water hazard to within 15 feet of the hole, which he converted for birdie to beat Kiwi Grant Waite at the 2000 Canadian Open.
As a golfer for over 30 years, I've seen my share of insane shots at my home Poverty Bay course.
A slam-dunk 5-iron hole-in-one by Zak Proudfoot on the 11th; Mark “Tuffers” Trufitt's 8-iron second shot on the third hole where his ball rebounded off a green-side tree, on to the green and into the hole for eagle-2 after a triple-bogey, triple-bogey start; Alex Tait's incredible 230-metre 2-iron, after hitting a tree off the 18th tee, to set up a birdie-3 and victory over Hamish Douglas in the quarterfinal of the 2003 Poverty Bay Open, which Tait went on to win.
But there is one shot that, to this golfing connoisseur, stands above the rest — a shot witnessed by a small, beer-fuelled entourage that earned one of their own golfing immortality.
It came during the inaugural Friday mercantile nine-hole ambrose golf league at Poverty Bay.
The Gisborne Herald team, led by chief photographer Paul Rickard, had not only intensified the social atmosphere of the league into one of “let's party”, they were also leading a tightly contested series.
That came under threat on the 16th and last hole one fateful night.
Ambrose is a friendly form of team golf. Everybody tees off, you pick the best shot, then everybody hits from that spot and so on until you finish the hole, with one score for all.
The Herald six-person team's second shots into the par-4 16th that day were a disaster . . . so bad that the best of the bad bunch was through the green and down a steep hill.
What made it even worse was that the pin was located at the very top of a sloping green.
To get your ball remotely close required a shot somewhere between walking on water and turning that water into wine.
The Herald didn't know it at the time but there was a messiah in their midst.
Otto Dunn pulled out his sand wedge and let fly. The ball hit the up slope, bounced on, raced down the green, hit the pin and dropped in.
It was a shot heard around the golf course.
“You could try that 999,999 more times, and you'd never sink it,” a head-shaking Rickard opined.
The Herald went on to win the league.
Otto is with us no more but he remains forever in hearts and memories, enhanced by that magical shot.